The Gathering
by Corvus no Genmu
Summary: "This is bad. Did you hear what he called Usagi? He called her princess. He recognized her Artemis. Even disguised as a Senshi, he saw her when even we, her advisors, could not." The White Moon Cat looked away, refusing to meet her eyes. "They remember Artemis. The Servants of Terra remember everything…"
1. 00: Prophecy

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

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**Author's Note:** Feeling the need to actually create something of an actual story rather than a long series of drabbles for the upcoming holiday season, I present to you the result of a conversation that involved classic and modern anime, an old fanfiction or two of mine, and an overabundance of sugar and caffeine. Admittedly, I had planned for this to be a strictly Halloween-style fiction (that is to say naught but horror and the like) but given my love of this particular franchise and my inability to keep the romantic in me silent I've decided to extend this story out all the way to New Years. This won't be a long story per say, hardly more than twelve chapters if even that much but I sincerely hope that it's one that you all will enjoy it. That being said, allow me to present to you:

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**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

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00: Prophecy

_"There is no darkness, only a lack of light. There is no cold, only a lack of heat. There is no peace, only a lack of war."_

A bloodied red sky sits like the final curtain call over a dead husk of a world. Vivid blackened rips tears like lightning across a once pristine field of blue and now a dirtied rag of red. A blackened eye what once was called the sun sits on the horizon, an everlasting twilight across an unmoving world. Shattered pieces of ivory, what once was the moon, circle like ethereal grave markers in a red sea. On the surface of the dead world, towers of unbendable steel and pristine glass are naught but heaps of rubble, half-leaning monstrosities that are teetering on the edge of their full oblivion. Cars litter the streets like scattered toys and everywhere, as far as the eye could see.

Nothing living.

Nobody dead.

No one but her….

Standing in transfixed terror of the corpse that her world had become, her eyes wavered about like a cornered animal trying to find something—anything—to bring back a spark of hope to this horrific place. People lay scattered about her, none alive or dead but simple there, as shadows of what they had been all laid down gently to sleep as the Earth started to wither and die around them. She ran through the sleeping crowd of the dead, trying to find at least one person awake, one person standing up against whatever caused this horror to affect the world.

Her eyes fell upon seven figures, five of which she knew almost instantly. A small spark of hope was lit in her heart for though she did not recognize all of the gathered women, she was well aware of the power in them. The majority shined with the power of the elements themselves but the strongest of the gathered seven shined like the heart of the cosmos compared to the others in her midst.

She raced to them, calling to them in the soundless void and choked on the words that could not be heard. For though the seven soldiers were standing, they too had not been left unscathed by the eldritch horrors. The heroes were dead, turned to breakable stone, forever frozen in their defiant stances against the hellish force that brought them to an end, the light of their magic but a faint cinder in the void of what remained of their souls.

Looking around her, she saw that what she had presumed as abstract pieces of rubble at the heart of the Silence were in fact people, all turned to stone just like the heroes. Yet where the heroes stood facing the growing Silence, the people were caught frozen in fear, all running away from the same terrible thing. Her eyes shot upwards as the terrible nothingness _—The_ _Silence—_ appeared on the horizon, a fierce gale shooting past her as black tendrils writhed and drew closer.

In the soundless city, the sound of church bells ringing was startling, even more so because of its source. Whirling behind her, the young maiden saw a shining sun, the only light in this bleak and blackened world. It chimed once more before splitting itself asunder into three shining stars that shone with holy brilliance. For a moment, she thought this miracle had come to help but the trio of lights vanished away from_ The_ _Silence_, uncaring for the poor souls they had abandoned to eldritch horrors.

_The song that angels sing…_

She collapsed to her knees, looking back to the approaching wall of nothingness and watched with tears falling from her eyes as it reached the city limits and with the slightest touch, tore whole building asunder while cars were sent flying as though smacked by a giant unseen hand. The bodies of the dead proved to be just as brittle as the stone that covered them for they shattered to dust before they were swallowed by the merciless _Silence_.

_"The spell that calls The Gathering…"_

She looked up and saw the expanding void pause in its steadfast approach. Silken tendrils hesitating in their outstretching grasp before a multitude of energies flew overhead. Powers beyond mortal comprehension impacted against _The Silence_ and it writhed in a soundless agony, flinching back from the onslaught that would not end so long as the eldritch abomination continued its advance.

_"The magic th_at might bring…"

Roars of great beasts echoed once more, a brilliant flash of light shining, and five armored figures appeared to stand beside the frozen soldiers. _The Silence_ trembled and rose swiftly in a terrible fury, charging forward with greater speed for no longer did these interlopers frighten it into submission. No, they had earned its inherent rage, its inhuman hatred, and would pay the price with their hearts and souls alike! The armored warriors raised their weapons high, roaring in challenge to this unspoken decree and raced forward to meet the void headlong.

"Eternal life… **The Gathering!**"

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_To be continued..._

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_**Next time...**_

_**Sway**_

"_We pray for our sorrows to end, and hope that our hearts will blend. Now I will step forward to realize this wish. And who knows: starting a new journey may not be so hard, or maybe… it has already begun._"


	2. 01: Sway

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

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**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

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01: Sway

"_We pray for our sorrows to end, and hope that our hearts will blend. Now I will step forward to realize this wish. And who knows: starting a new journey may not be so hard, or maybe… it has already begun._"

Rei Hino is as much an oracle as she is a medium. That is to say, she did not perceive her visions by force of will or conscious choice but rather they often came to her through dreams in the light of the moon or as startling images across a holy fire. However unwilling the dream visions were, Rei could at least control what she perceived through the sacred fires of her temple. Visions such as those could be wild, even chaotic, but with enough focus she could keep them locked on the present rather than a forgotten past and an inconceivable future. Why, she could even trap the memories of her dreams in the flames and see the order behind the chaos. However… no matter how hard she focused her energies, Rei could not perceive the depths of her latest nightmare.

Though its clarity was as clear as crystal in the sacred fires, there was no more understanding to them now than when she first bore witness to them. The entire world nothing but a dead husk with its destroyer approaching on the horizon… Her friends, dead and turned to hardened stone as they stood defiant against the force… The shattered pieces of holy light that _fled_ from the destruction… The monstrous warriors that charged to their doom regardless of the consequences so long as they died _fighting _against…

_The Silence…_

Rei's hands paused in their motions, the blazing fires before her dimming down to normalcy, the vision vanishing into smoke lapped away by burning tongues of a mundane fire. There was a light in the young shrine maiden's eyes that spoke of renewed hope though her mouth was set in a concerned frown and her shoulders trembled with a whispering of fear. Though she knew not who or what they were, Rei knew those monsters that had appeared to fight against _The Silence_ were more than appeared. Though shadows, both as beasts and as the warriors they had become, she knew them as animals first and foremost while the strongest of them was more.

They all were…

Rei sighed and pushed herself to her feet, suddenly finding the once welcoming warmth of the shrine's sacred fire too stifling to soothe her troubles away. Stepping outside, she glanced up at the midday sky, taking some comfort in its natural blues and cottony clouds of white that drifted lazily to wherever the winds may take them. Still… some extra reassurance would not be too bad would it?

"Twenty-seven…" She read on the drawing stick and leaned into the small shrine outing to grab the matching omikuji. Taking the small scroll in hand, Rei leaned back and carefully unrolled it. Whatever hope she had to gain from the fortune was dashed and she frowned at its simple, one-worded message. She headed over to the nearby cherry tree whose branches were already quite full with fortunes. Just as she finished tying her own amongst them, Rei's ESP kicked in loud and clear with a simple, but straightforward, message.

_GET AWAY!_

She leapt back by sheer reflex and not a moment too soon as the cherry tree twisted and turned about itself as it tore itself free from the earth, an unearthly pained groan growing into an frighteningly human shriek of agony. A pillar of dark light spread outwards from the tree until it was a veritable tower of demonic energy as the tree shifted into a humanoid shape. The light died away to reveal a female monster with pale violet skin, dressed in a revealing kimono with a mock replica of the temple's bells and thick prayer rope atop her head like a bow. Like the shoes on her feet and the cuffs that adorned her wrists and ankles, her hair was composed of wood though it moved like human hair would atop her head.

"_MIKUJI!_"

"W-What the?!" Rei gasped at the sight of the monster. Its energies were nothing like what she had felt from the youma of Queen Beryl's realm and she knew for certain that the Black Moon Family's droids were nothing more but rusted scrap. The appearance of this creature could only mean that her vision, however far ahead into the future it might be, was beginning to come to pass.

"Your heart… Your pure heart!" Mikuji smiled, beckoning at Rei with mahogany claws. "Give me your pure heart!"

Rei's hands clenched as she glared at the kaijin, the fires of defiance clear in her amethyst eyes. She glanced back at the temple, knowing that her grandfather would surely have heard the noise if not felt the massive demonic energies of this creature. She couldn't risk him getting involved even if she managed to transform before he charged in with ofuda blazing in his hands.

She had to lead this thing away.

"You want my heart?" She asked Mikuji. "Well, just try and take it!"

Without another word, she took a page out of Usagi's book and ran like her life depended on it. Mikuji watched the girl run with a playful smile on her face, honestly amused by shrine maiden's antics. She slowly began to rise in the air and, with another fierce scream of her name, shot after her prey. Caught in the updraft of her flight; the little paper fortune that had led to her birth fluttered past.

_Misfortune._

* * *

The streets of Juuban are busy as always, and how could they not be? Being a district of Tokyo and practically within spitting distance of its famous tower, it is a district that was always bustling with activity day or night. Though the sun was still high in the sky and the weather all but perfect, there was a strange feeling in the air that tugged at primordial instincts. Instincts that whispered something was wrong and it was best for all involved to get as far away from that something as possible. Unknowingly following this instinct, many of the citizens of Juuban went long out of their way to avoid the nearby Hikawa Shrine.

Except for him.

The boy was thin, almost scarecrow thin some would say, especially for his age of eighteen years and his short stature. His clothes were of simple make and would blend better with the darkness of a moonless light though this did little to hide the fact that he is a foreigner to these lands. A light tan and the feathers tied in the obsidian braid upon his back spoke of his Native American heritage and his eyes, slate gray, were narrowed in a fierce glare to any passerby that dared to give him a longer glance than necessary. This was perfectly understandable in a way considering not just his exotic appearance but by the way in which he walked and the devices he used to accomplish this feat. A pair of metal braces, strapped tightly to the outside of his jeans and a walking stick to better aid his precarious sense of balance made it all too apparent what faulted the lad.

His name is Horatio Alexander and, by his own words and always with a humorous smirk on his tanned face, he's as lame as they come.

A faint sound of ruffling wings drew Horatio's eyes to the sky and he smiled as a familiar pair of ravens set themselves upon his shoulders. They cawed in greeting, both affectionately rubbing their heads under his throat and earning a pleased chuckle from the lad.

"Hello there girls… How's your Lady this day?" He asked.

The raven on his left drooped her head while the one on his right clacked her beak.

"Ah, so she has begun to _see_ it then… We had wondered—"

The birds and boy together turned their heads sharply up to the top of the stairs as the air was rent by a silent scream followed shortly by a beam of black light exploding upwards to the heavens. A young girl screamed as another female voice, distinctly inhuman, laughed at her torment as the chase began. As one, the crows took off for their friend and master while the boy remained behind down below the stairs he could not hope to climb.

Not in his current form.

The choker upon his neck glimmered, the sword pendant shining with its own inner light.

"**_Sway and sunder…_**"

"Sunder and sway…" Horatio intoned.

"**_Nevermore._**"

* * *

Rei ran through the trees along the outer wall of the shrine, dodging branches and attacks alike until she managed to gain enough distance to take the risk of attempting a transformation before the monster caught up to her. Transformation wand in hand, Rei prepared to call out the spell when the monster came soaring through the wood like a bat fresh out of Hell. The monster's hands clutched her wrists in a vice before melting into stone and keeping her arms in place against the barrier wall of the shrine. The force of the blow was startling enough for Rei to drop the transformation wand to the ground, leaving her as a mere human against a monster of remarkable power and skill.

Mikuji floated back from her prey with a smirk as new hands grew from the wooden cuffs on her wrists. "Your fortune today is VERY BAD!"

Appearing in the air beside the monster like some form of wraith was a woman dressed in a short, business-like red dress that revealed enough of her chest to be almost slutty if she didn't somehow maintain a strange, alien regality to her person. Phasing fully into place, the woman would be almost human were she not floating in the air beside the monster as she spoke to it. "Daimon Mikuji, there might be a talisman hidden in this girl. Take her pure heart."

"Daimon…?" whispered Rei. Not a youma and certainly not a droid… and if this monster's purpose was to take her pure heart, how was it to do so? Rei's question was answered as Mikuji pulled open her kimono to reveal a black star tattooed to her purple skin just above the valley of her cleavage. With a cry of her name, the star came alive with the same dark light that birthed her and shot forth a beam that hit Rei straight in her breast, right above where her heart lay.

The young miko screamed as it felt like her very heart was being torn asunder while the daimon's master smiled with growing satisfaction.

"It's only a matter of time before we see results. Still, better to not count all your eggs before they hatch I suppose. Mikuji! I shall go seek other humans that have the possibility of holding talismans." She teleported away, leaving Rei to her suffering as a black orb coalesced before her chest as Mikuji increased the energy output of the beam until, at long last, she got what she wanted.

With a sound not unlike the sound of an angel's bell, the darkness was washed away by a globe of light that condensed together to form a crystalline cross, the material embodiment of Rei's pure heart. The pure heart crystal, shining from within by a blazing compassion, shone red in the light of the sun.

Mikuji smiled and beckoned the heart crystal to her as she gloated her victory. "A heart crystal this unique must hold a talisman!"

However, before the crystal was even halfway towards her, she was suddenly pulled from behind by her rope-braid and slammed into the ground with earth shaking force. Before she had chance to even gasp in pain, Mikuji was kicked hard enough in the side that, had she any actual ribs, would have shattered them to pieces. As it was, the blow sent the daimon flying into the trunk of a tree with enough force to crack it in two.

She coughed blackish blue blood and rose unsteadily to her feet as the pure heart crystal was gently taken into the hands of her attacker. Mikuji looked up and saw her assailant fully.

He was short statured, just barely taller than the miko herself and was slim on the muscular side. The obsidian portions of his armor were intricately cared to resemble feathers along their outer edges and outlined in thin streams of gold. The gauntlets on his arms flowed back in a strange formation similar to the flight feathers of a bird. The inch-long claws on the fingers accented this all-too well. His helmet was shaped to resemble the body of a diving raven, the wings pulling back a few inches past his head with the golden beak resting between the bloodied red lenses that covered the warrior's eyes. Upon his neck was a choker that held a spade at its front but the strangest thing about him was what lay upon his back. At first glance, it could almost be called a feathered cloak but such was not what they were though they served well in hiding what lay strapped between them.

"Give it to me," said the Avian Warrior.

"Wha-What…?" gasped Mikuji, clutching her side as the wooden cracks slowly started to reseal, trying to buy some time until she regenerated enough to bring true misfortune upon the interloper. "Do you… want…?"

"Your life. **_Autumn's Karas_**."

The wings upon the Warrior's back snapped open and closed together in a massive flap. The feathers upon the Warrior's wings flew through the air like arrows and Mikuji stood uncaring to their approach for she foolishly thought them a distraction and nothing more. That however sharp their points might be, they could not possibly pierce her wooden hide and even if they could, her regenerative capabilities would

By the time she realized the truth, the bladed tips of the metallic feathers pierced straight through her body and into the trees behind her save for one which remained jammed through her left eye and caught midway through her brain.

Regeneration or not, some wounds are impossible to fully heal.

Mikuji didn't even have the chance to collapse to the ground, not when a hand clutched upon her throat in an increasingly tightening vice.

"Me… Mer—"

"Mercy? No. Mercy is for the living." The Obsidian Knight's grip tightened and Mikuji's neck snapped like a twig. "And you're already dead."

The Avian Warrior's wings returned once more to clasp tightly upon his back, covering the weapon he bore as the tree that Mikuji had arisen from fell to the earth, the center of the trunk crushed beyond recognition. He watched as a small seed flowed from the remains of the tree before it shattered upon the ground and released a small smoky phantom that writhed in agony beneath his gaze. It soon vanished like ash on the winds. The Avian Warrior regarded the remains for a moment more before turning his gaze up into the shadowed canopy above.

"Was there a reason why you felt like standing on the sidelines while she suffered under that monster's clutches?" The wings rustled upon his back, steely black feathers glistening in the light. "Think carefully before you answer me."

Silence before the shortest of the pair hiding away in the shadows answered. "We need to see if that heart crystal contains a talisman."

"Yes, so the witch had spoken." The Avian Warrior agreed, caressing the jeweled heart in his grasp, his glimmering red lenses locked upon it like it was the most precious thing in all of Creation. "What then, would you do with this pure heart crystal if it does contain one of these talismans?"

"That is irrelevant." The tallest snapped.

The Obsidian Knight's head snapped up to glare at them as his wings flared open. Only then did the pair become aware that his were not the only eyes upon them. A murder of crows, several dozen at least, were amongst the branches and were all as silent as the grave as they stared down upon the pair with beady obsidian eyes.

"Not to me. Not when it concerns innocent people. Not when it concerns her." A blur of falling feathers and he was kneeling at Rei's side, the crystal in his hands floating forth and seamlessly falling back into her chest.

"NO!" snapped the tallest. "You fool, do you even realize—" She was halted by the gentle hand of her companion, who met the Avian Warrior's stare with her own shadowed glare despite the sudden decreased proximity between them and the flock or how the gleam in the birds' eyes had gained a reddish hue.

"You're lucky that I was able to see that the crystal did not contain a talisman." With her words said, the pair vanished out of sight. The gathered ravens watched them as they went before setting their eyes down upon the Avian Warrior who seemed almost amused by the young woman's departing words as his wings ruffled upon his back.

"They truly don't remember… Mores the pity I suppose." He sighed before gently grasping Rei's shoulder. "Are you well, Lady Aries?"

Though incredibly groggy and weak from her ordeal, Rei had enough wits about her to focus her eyes upon her armored savior but not enough to speak before he suddenly snapped to his feet, turning back to face the sudden burst of energy he felt from behind followed by a very familiar voice crying out.

"Hold it right there!" Standing on the broken remains of the tree trunk that once was a powerful daimon, Sailor Moon glared with righteous indignation upon the Avian Warrior like the heroine she was as she went full out on her speech. "For love and justice, the pretty soldier in a sailor suit! I'm Sailor Moon! I won't forgive anyone for harassing a pure-hearted miko like you have done!"

_Oh no…_ thought Rei as she feebly started to push herself upright.

Just behind Sailor Moon appeared three more similarly dressed young girls. They too similarly agreed with their leader and introduced themselves somehow in the process. The Avian Warrior looked them over slowly one at a time. _Sailor Venus, Sailor Jupiter, Sailor Mercury, and… Huh… will wonders never cease?_

"So you are Sailor Senshi." The Avian Warrior inclined his head to the side, crossing his arms over his chest as he regarded Sailor Moon. "Better late than never, eh…?"

"We're certainly on time to save that priestess from you, villain!" Sailor Moon shouted back.

The Obsidian Knight's head lowered slightly and Rei saw how tightly he clenched his fists that they were shaking.

"You don't get to judge me. Not now, not as you are. If you had even an inkling of memory…"

Sailor Jupiter, not seeing the rising angry in the Avian Warrior, led the charge as electricity gathered around her tiara. "**_Supreme Thunder!_**"

Lightning flashed through the air and impacted against obsidian wings. The Obsidian Knight took two large steps back from the force of the strike but did not appear hurt otherwise. His wings unfurled slowly with a faint growl of irritation.

"That. Hurt." A blur of feathered darkness and he was upon Jupiter, spinning with a fierce kick to her torso that sent her flying through the air. He raced to follow in her wake only to find his path blocked by Sailor Venus, a finger outstretched.

"_Crescent Beam!_" A thin beam of intense yellow light shot forth from the blonde Senshi's finger and hit nothing but air as the Avian Warrior took to the air. She had time enough to blink before Sailor Venus was set upon by a vicious storm of steel that sliced through her uniform with ease but nary touched upon her flesh. It was a diversionary tactic from the airborne knight and nothing more than that as he set his sights down upon Sailor Mercury, not that she gave him the chance to attack.

"_Shine Aqua Illusion!_" Water flew from the blue Senshi's hands and, upon impact, would have frozen the Obsidian Knight in a solid block of ice had he not rolled out of the way and dove down towards Sailor Mercury with a frightening scream. His feet hit her hard in the stomach and, grabbing her by the shoulders and took once more to the air. He spun and tossed her back at Sailor Jupiter. The two Scouts collided and rolled for a few yards before stopping in a crumpled heap not far from where Sailor Venus stood still woozy and hurting from his attack though no evidence of his feathers littered the earth still.

"Girls!" Sailor Moon cried before focusing on the Avian Warrior as he landed back onto the ground. "That's it! Prepare to be moon-dusted!" Taking her scepter in hand, she gathered power at its tip.

Beneath the lenses of his helmet, the Obsidian Knight's eyes widened before he reached back to grasp the hilt of his weapon.

"Don't make me do this, Princess." He whispered too quietly for Sailor Moon to hear.

But not so for certain pair of felines…

"**_Moon Princess Halation!_**" cried Sailor Moon, unleashing a lunar shape disc of power with magical might focused as a beam driving it forward.

"**_Sound of Silence_**," whispered the Avian Warrior.

**SWIPE**.

In the blink of an eye, he was there, his face mere inches away from her own with his sword held parallel to the earth, the scepter cleaved asunder in her hands and the brooch gone from its place on her breast.

It was over.

With a flash of pinkish light, the uniform of the Sailor Senshi unraveled into a series of energy ribbons. In a moment's time, Sailor Moon reverted back to her human self, a mere teenage girl named Usagi Tsukino who promptly fell back on her behind, her eyes wide with shock and fear. Standing tall before her, slowly returning his blade back to its sheath upon his back, the Avian Warrior regarded the compact in his hand.

With a casualness that spoke of intimate familiarity, the Obsidian Knight opened the compact just in time to see the light of the Silver Imperium Crystal flicker and die.

Rei stared in complete and utter disbelief, an emotion shared by the other Sailor Senshi as they, like her, were frozen in shock by what they had just seen. One man had single-handedly dealt with the strongest attack in their arsenal. He looked back down to Usagi who was frantically trying to hide her face from his gaze. He chuckled in amusement before snatching her flailing wrist.

"Eek!"

"Don't you touch—" Sailor Jupiter's threat died on her tongue as the Avian Warrior set the brooch once more in Usagi's hand.

"Sorry. It's a pretty little trinket… but I already took it once before."

"Wh-Who are you…?" stuttered Usagi, her wide eyes starring up into the masked visage of the Obsidian Knight as his wings spread for takeoff.

"I am Saber."

"W-Wait!" In an instant, his wings were curled upon his back, which was turned to Usagi and the remaining Senshi as he regarded the now standing Rei Hino. She took a strengthening gasp of air and bowed to him. "Thank you… for saving my life…"

Saber's wings rustled upon his back and the Obsidian Knight's tilted his head. "You… are welcome."

He sounded so uncertain of the words, as though he were unfamiliar in giving them. Before she could try and speak again, he took off into the open air and as soon as he touched the open sky, an entire murder of crows followed in his wake before suddenly dispersing as quickly as they had come.

He was gone.

Beneath the bush where they were strategically watching from, two former advisors to the crown turned to one another.

"Was that who I thought it was…?" whispered Artemis.

"It was… This is bad Artemis. This is really bad." Luna said. "Did you hear what he called Usagi?"

The white cat's eyes widened. "He called her Princess…"

The black cat nodded. "He recognized her Artemis. Even disguised, he saw her when even we, her _advisors_, could not."

"Then… Does that mean?"

"They remember Artemis. The Servants of Terra remember _everything…_"

* * *

The young man sat alone in the foyer of the largest house on the street, a mansion some would say. He was dressed for relaxation with an emerald robe tied over the dark grays of casual slacks and a plain white shirt. His brown locks were brushed back from his shining emerald orbs with the back falling to the lower nape of his neck. By his build, both in his size and his facial structure, he was Germanic perhaps of even from the United Kingdom, but where his other parentage came from it was hard to tell. Though he is young, barely past nineteenth year, he seemed almost older if only by the way he carried himself, the kind of tiredness born from experience.

He leaned back in his chair, idly twirling a glass full of a liquid that seemed too crystal clear to just be ordinary water. He took a long drink and sighed with relief, the tenseness in his shoulders loosening before his ears twitched and emerald eyes opened to regard the door. The world through those eyes is a world without color beyond shades of gray, but now as the one behind the door places his hand upon it, color returns in the form of a comrade-in-arms. One who, like so few others, holds the power of _magic_ in their veins, enough to shine like stars in eyes incapable of seeing the world through any other means.

His name is Dirk von Horte and he is concerned, for the Nevermore was fresh upon the flesh of—

"Horatio." The weak-legged boy paused, the doorknob still clutched in his hand, his walking stick in the other. "What happened?

"… I revealed myself to the enemy and to the Senshi." He answered back, shutting the door carefully behind him. He shuffled over to the chair sitting opposite of Dirk and took a seat upon it with a relieved sigh. "They attacked Lady Mars." Dirk frowned and the younger man looked away from the pity in those emerald eyes as he amended his words, "Lady Mars' reincarnation… Would you have done different had it been her instead?"

"No…" Dirk sighed and he started to swirl the water in his glass, watching the slow revolutions with an indifferent air. "I trust that you at least did not show yourself to the Prince?"

"The fight with the Senshi was over too quickly for that."

Dirk's eyes snapped up at that. "What? You _fought _them?"

Horatio winced and looked aside. "They started it…"

"They _always _start it, you, _all of you_, are supposed to be better than them and grow up! It's been millennia for the Cauldron's sake!" snapped Dirk. His eyes narrowed with a sudden realization. "Did you use it?"

Horatio paused for a long moment before he answered. "… I did. But I had reason to."

"Really? You had a reason to use one of the most powerful weapons in this System second only to one other? Pray tell me, what dangerous force were you up against that would warrant such stupidity?"

"The Princess."

Dirk's eyes widened in surprise before they narrowed into thin, reptilian slits. "Explain."

"She is a Senshi now. The one they call Sailor Moon."

"So she isn't some sort of body double…" muttered Dirk to himself before he asked Horatio, "You're certain of this?"

"There is no mistake. I held the Silver Imperium Crystal in my hands once more this day. There's nothing equal to the shine of that particular gem in all of Creation. Besides, the Sword would not have acted as it had if it wasn't her."

"No… All's the better that the Prince was otherwise engaged. You have to be more careful Horatio. This isn't the Silver Millennium or the Golden Era. This Bronze Period is much more fragile and we can't afford to have the Senshi remember us. Not yet."

Horatio sighed and nodded. "If that's all, I'm going to sleep. For a day or two." He slowly pushed himself to his feet and shuffled his way towards the hallway.

"By the way… how was it? Fighting as Saber once more?"

Horatio paused at the precipice before he turned and grinned at Dirk. "Fantastic."

* * *

The sun was only beginning to set when she entered her bedroom, dressed for sleep and utterly exhausted over the day's events and resulting fallout. Too tired to even try and remember the day's multiple tragic turns, the teenaged girl collapsed upon her bed. She grumbled tiredly to herself as she turned to face her nightstand, her hand reaching out to set her alarm for school when she saw it.

She sat up with a start, staring at it with stunned eyes and gaping mouth for though she had seen plenty of them over the years living with her grandfather at Hikawa Shrine, Rei Hino had never seen a raven's feather such as this one. For one thing, though its shape and coloration were exact, its size was anything but, considering it would fit on the wings of a raven the size of a horse.

_Or a human…_ She noted then, the distinctive sheen to it and hesitantly tapped her finger upon it. Hard and metallic, a feather conformed into a blade or a blade converted into a feather. Either way, there was no mistaking where this feather had come from.

"Saber…?" murmured Rei as she carefully picked up the feather and regarded it. It was strangely light like an actual feather. Looking back at her nightstand, she saw that the feather had been resting atop a piece of paper upon which was written two simple words.

**Forgive me.**

* * *

_To be continued..._

* * *

_**Next time...**_

**_Aim_**

"_I believe there's a hero in all of us, that keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble, and finally allows us to die with pride, even though sometimes we have to be steady, and give up the thing we want the most. Even our dreams._"


	3. 02: Aim

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

* * *

**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

* * *

02: Aim

"_I believe there's a hero in all of us, that keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble, and finally allows us to die with pride, even though sometimes we have to be steady, and give up the thing we want the most. Even our dreams._"

Darkness. That which is the absence of light, the embodiment of shadows from which all if not most of humanity has come to claim where evil is born. That which is the dark is not something so merely described as a source of evil or tyranny for such things can be found anywhere in existence be it under the light of the day or the shadows of the night. These mortal conceptions are not born in the darkness but rather choose to hide in it, taking advantage of the shadows to avoid the prying eyes that would search for them in the light and bring their evil to justice. Is it any wonder then that the headquarters of the group known only as the Death Busters can be found beneath the underneath, in a place where even the shadows tremble with fear?

Darker than dark, the laboratory of the Death Buster's leader and chief scientist, a man known only by his title of Professor, stands alone in the inky blackness where hundreds of test tubes are warmed by dark emerald fires that give the spacious room a haunting appearance made creepier by the man's Cheshire grin and the gleam of his ovular glasses. The test tubes are filled with a viscous liquid colored pink by the heat of the flames with a pebble-sized nucleus floating in their depths.

"Kaorinite." The Professor's voice echoed into the shadows, a softly spoken whisper strengthened by a faint growl of ire as the red-haired woman appeared behind the man with a healthy amount of distance between them. The man was not prone to anger and though his grin still remained, Kaorinite knew that the Professor was not pleased.

"Yes, Professor?"

"What is the purpose of the Death Busters?" The Professor asked like a teacher asking a child whether the sun was bright or the night dark.

Reciting more from practice than conscious thought, she answered, "To acquire the Holy Grail and control the world."

"And how are we going to get the Holy Grail?" asked the Professor.

"If we find the three Talismans within the pure hearts of the chosen ones we can use them to guide us to the Holy Grail."

Somehow, the Professor's smile stretched out even further, the light gleaming off his round spectacles. "That's right. For that, we must use the daimon eggs…"

He lifted a vial filled with a now pulsing embryo and poured it into a heating beaker full of maroon tinted chemicals. The pulsing of the embryo increased with its sudden increasing of girth until it grew too much for the beaker to contain and burst free of the glass. An egg now floated over the emerald flames, curved like the flesh of an orange but harder than stone, filled with an emptiness that could come only from true heartlessness. It floated upwards into the Professor's hands and his laughter echoed in the dark abyss of the laboratory.

"Now, find the pure heart that is just right for you." Koarinite commanded the egg in her Professor's stead and it obeyed, instantly flying up into the dark rafters and into one of the multitude of pipes that led out into the city.

* * *

It was a nightmare it just had to be. There was no other reason for the transformation to cancel itself like this, to revert her from the defender of love and justice to an ordinary high school girl. Usagi collapsed to her knees as the last of the transformation ribbons died away into her school uniform as her friends stood before her, fully transformed as the Sailor Senshi. They did not speak but their actions did all the talking for them. They turned their backs upon her and walked on without her, leaving her behind alone in the darkness.

No, not alone.

Saber stood beside her with several more shadowed warriors, glaring down upon her with vicious, bloodied eyes.

"You lost one fight and you've given up? Where is that defender that claims to fight for love and justice? The only thing that is preventing you from achieving your destiny is the fear of failure, Princess. Get up and fight Serenity. Get up. Get up! GET UP USAGI!"

* * *

The latest daimon was beating the Senshi. Beating them badly. It wasn't so much that they're attacks weren't doing some serious damage to the heartless monstrosity, but that the damnable thing had fully taken the properties of its chosen vessel. Whereas the daimon Mikuji had been birthed from a tree and so possessed the same inherent strengths and weaknesses, her younger sibling had arisen from a puzzle board and as such, could quite literally fall to pieces and just as easily reassemble them with no end in sight.

So it was hardly surprising that the Senshi were losing.

No. What was surprising was that he was watching it happen before his eyes.

Tasked as he was to observe, to watch and wait, it took every ounce of self-control not to charge in and kill the daimon Nekonell point blank. Not when _she_ was being injured, when her once glorious powers were reduced to a mere puddle of their former glory.

No.

He had to wait.

Wait for _them_.

And they did not disappoint.

They had come nearly on the tail of his cloak, and had waited in the shadows above just the same as he. Yet it was not until the Senshi and untransformed Princess were down and the pure heart crystalized that they revealed themselves. Their attacks, delivered almost in sync, did what the others could not and scattered the pieces of the daimon across the floor but even then, it was not fully dead. It had been killed but by their slow movement across the ground, there was life still in the abomination.

And they still did not care.

They commented on the weakness of the daimon, their disappointment of yet another crystal without a talisman, and turned their back on enemy and allies alike.

"We haven't defeated the enemy yet! If you are Senshi as well… fight with us!" Sailor Venus called out to the retreating pair.

Beneath the folds of his azure cloak, a gauntleted fist clenched tightly. His breathing turned ragged, eyes wide beneath an amethyst visor.

_"Watch for them." _Dirk had said. _"I want full confirmation that they have forgotten themselves fully."_

"Don't get the wrong idea." The taller spoke.

_"And… if they have?"_ He had asked, not bothering to hide the anticipation in his voice. After all, Saber had a chance to stretch his wings. Why couldn't he?

"Our mission is only to acquire the talismans. There's no way we can fight with you!" The taller one finished, turning her back to them.

_"Then do nothing. The affairs of the Senshi are **not** of our concern. Not anymore."_ Those were his orders. He was to obey them. He _should_ obey them and yet he could not help but feel…

"You should settle your own affairs by yourselves," stated the shorter.

_To **Hell **with them!_

"Cowards…" His voice, a guttural sound that was heard more as a growl than the low whisper it was meant to be. So he shouted, "Cowards!"

The room stilled, even the daimon midway through its restoration halted its motions from the roar that echoed in the desecrated mansion.

"You both are nothing but _cowards!_ You are _not_ Senshi!" He appeared only just enough from the shadows to make his form seen by those beneath him as the light of the sun shone through the stained glass window behind him. An armored visage half covered in a tattered cloak. "You are oath-breakers! Betrayers to the Crown! _Murderers of innocent people!_"

The smaller one gasped while the taller let her anger speak for her. "Who do you think you are?!"

A faint sound of clinking links in the rafters above and the armored figure turned sharply to it. Dangling from the ceiling was the remnants of a chandelier, now nothing more than a rusted chain stirring from an unnatural wind. He growled, a low feral sound deep in his throat, at the bitter reminder of his duties. "Consider yourselves fortunate that _he_ is more merciful than I, _scum!_ Pray the Princess and Her Court survives this fight because… if they don't?"

**BANG**.

A sound not unlike that of a cannon being fired preceded the demolition of an entire wall and the blinding light of the setting sun cast the armored figure's shadow upon the pair.

"Need I say more?"

And he was gone in a sudden flurry of snowflakes…

* * *

It is not uncommon for arcades of any sort to be littered with the occasional bit of primal utterances by its patrons. Games, no matter the sort, often invoke such a response, especially when a loss is becoming rapidly apparent. Yet with one particular patron of Juuban's King's Cross Arcade, that was actually the opposite.

He stood tall, an inch or so short of a full six foot stature, and was obviously a foreigner not just from his distinctive height but the bloodied red of his slicked back hair and the rusted blue of his eyes. By his build and slight accent, one could rightfully assume him a Norse. Upon his neck was a choker decorated with a small medallion shaped like a pair of arrows. He was dressed warmly too though it was well into spring, with a long trench coat with the long tails billowing behind him as he moved to the attack. Out the corner of his eye, he saw his prey spring upwards and the trigger was pulled before emergence was completed. A bloody explosion of what once was a digitalized head was the result and the game's screen flashed brightly: NEW RECORD!

The red-haired youth, who could hardly be any older than eighteen years, grinned in satisfaction and huffed a pleased grunt.

"Wow… that's… really good." Minako murmured, a faint blush on her cheeks as she watched Eirik shoot out his initials in the game's records. "And he did all that left-handed too…"

Usagi, even more stunned than her fellow blonde, wordlessly nodded her head.

Behind them, manning the arcade's counter, Motoki shook his head ruefully. "That guy… Man."

"Do you know him Motoki?" asked Minako.

"That's—"

"_My name_," interrupted the red-haired young man stepping up to the counter, "_is Eirik Ejnar_."

Though startled that he was speaking in English, Minako could not resist the urge to show off to her friend and responded back in kind. "_O-Oh! Hello there! My name's Minako Aino!_" She held out her right hand to him in the Western form of greeting.

"_Forgive me if I don't respond in kind Miss Aino._" Eirik turned slightly to reveal a nearly empty right sleeve. The stub of his arm move to show he possessed enough of the limb up to the elbow but nothing more beneath. He continued, switching to Japanese as he inclined his head in greeting, "But I thank you for the consideration."

Minako's face went red in embarrassment and she hastily retracted her offered hand with an embarrassed laugh. At least she couldn't possibly embarrass herself further.

"What happened to your arm?"

Not when she had Usagi to do that for her at any rate.

"Usagi!" She hissed at the bun-haired blonde who jumped with realization that her tongue had gotten away from her and she hastily bowed in apology to Eirik who simply chuckled.

"Ah, I don't mind it when people come at me straight away without any of that delicacy nonsense… Most people don't even bother asking. They seem to be under the impression that by staring at it I'll be inclined to tell them." Eirik said with a pointed look at Motoki who hastily looked away with an embarrassed blush. Turning back to the girls, he continued, "As to what happened, it's not all of my tale to tell but if you care to know just ask—"

The sound of the door opening interrupted him and his eyes darkened as he turned with a vicious snarl at the intruder. "Attention-seeking Asshole."

"Bloodthirsty Bastard," said the newcomer without pause as she walked into the arcade, sparring a cordial nod at a nervous Motoki, a curious glance at the girls, and settled on a heated glare upon Eirik.

"Heh. You're learning Haruka." Eirik grinned, revealing that his canines were sharper than any person's ought to be. "I'm ahead by three now. Good luck catching up to me."

Haruka's eyes narrowed. "Two. I just came from Litwak's."

"So Litwak's finally opened eh…? This I have to see for myself." He started for the exit but stopped to look back at the two blonde-haired girls. "Before the Cross-dressing Casanova over there interrupted me—"

"Screw you."

"Yeah not even if I were drunk. Anyway, as I was saying, if you want my story just go and ask Ami-chan." With nothing left to say to the pair, he headed out without another word save for a parting word to Haruka. "Later bitch."

"God forbid, bastard." She muttered before heading over to the nearest racing game that did not yet sport her name at the top of the records list. True she was supposed to meet up with Michiru soon but like hell she'd let Eirik stay ahead of her for longer than she had too! _Two in his favor my sweet ass!_

Usagi and Minako barely took notice of the girl who could, and had on multiple occasions, stirred many a female heart with a bishonen glance. No, the two were far too busy trying to compute the idea that someone like their dear friend Ami Mizuno could possibly know someone like Eirik Enjar.

* * *

"Vroom! Vroom!"

Some could say that daimons are inherently childish in their own unique fashions. Some take to the properties of their chosen vessels like fish to water and birds to the open sky. Yet it isn't just the physical properties that give identity to the daimons but what those items represent. In the case of Mikuji, she had been birth by a tree that housed many a fortune, good or bad, and took to uttering the phrase of misfortune with every attack. For the puzzle-pieced body of Nekonell, hers was a puzzle with a feline motif and aside from her distinctly cat-girlish form she gained a vocal quirk of adding "nell" to the end of her sentences.

Steeringoo, having been arisen from a car, made vrooming noise as she drove.

Rather moot all considering but that was daimons for you.

Having just gotten away with the pure heart crystal firmly in bosom, the car-shaped daimon was cruising down one of Juuban's flood control channels thinking she was home free.

The Azure Knight in her path said otherwise.

Tall and broad shouldered, his entire right side was covered by a tattered white cloak that fell down to his ankles while his left side lay bare and emptied. Though his armor was predominately blue, there were a few portions either entirely or outlined in metallic silver. The claws on the fingers of his gauntleted right hand and both his boots were a deep, rich purple while the visor was a familiar blooded red clasped tightly in the jaws of the lupine design atop his helmet, complete with pointed ear-like apparatuses at the sides. Upon his neck was a choker with a heart shaped pendant.

Steeringoo smirked and kicked up the gas.

**BANG.**

She screamed an agonized cry as her left wheel was shot clean off right at the axle. She spun and tumbled like a demented top before grinding to a halt only a few yards away from the Lupine Warrior. His cloak had been thrown back, to reveal the massive Gatling gun that he held still smoking in his grasp. As she arose shakily to her feet, Steeringoo realized that the Azure Knight wasn't carrying the gun in his right hand.

The gun _is_ his hand.

And its steaming barrels, three in all, were aimed directly upon her.

"Let me make this perfectly clear to you." The Lupine Warrior spoke rather amicably as though he were chatting with a friend rather than with a daimon. "You're going to die. How you die is entirely dependent on whether you give me that crystalized heart you stole."

"Ho-Hold it right there daimon!" Both warrior and monster looked up and saw a panting Sailor Venus sitting astride a bike with Sailor Moon beside her. "For love and justice, the pretty soldier in a sailor suit! I am Sailor Moon and in the name of the moon I will punish you!"

"Wait a minute, you made me petal the bike! Don't you go making only yourself look cool by hogging the opening speech!" said Sailor Venus.

Sailor Moon sweat-dropped and looked askance her fellow Senshi and chuckled weakly.

"I don't care about you little traffic obstructions!" snarled Steeringoo. She turned to face the Lupine Warrior. With a loud snap of sliding steel, blades emerged from her remaining wheels. "I'm going to—"

"Hold it!"

"Oh for the love of Knievel!" Steeringoo cried, looking on the opposite side of where Sailors Moon and Venus were to see two others standing tall and condescending. "More of you?!"

"Guided by a new era, acting with elegance, I am Sailor Uranus!" stated the taller blonde.

"Also guided by a new era, acting with grace, I am Sailor Neptune!" proclaimed the shorter with hair of oceanic hues.

"They _are _Senshi!" exclaimed Sailor Venus.

"So the traitors decide to make themselves known at last," drawled the Azure Knight. "Did my words actually hit what remains of your dignity or did the shadows final tire of your bull?"

Sailor Neptune visibly winced at the accusation while Sailor Uranus' eyes widened in recognition of that familiar voice. "You! You look like that guy back at the shrine! Just who are you people?!"

"So you met Saber did you? Tell me, did you still have your valuables on you when you ran off like cowards after he refused to let you take the crystalized heart of a… innocent shrine maiden?"

Sailor Neptune's eyes widened before they narrowed with anger while Sailor Uranus growled. The latter had all of her cash missing from her wallet while the former was missing her favorite pair of earrings.

"As to who I am… You can call me Archer." He turned to face Steeringo. "Now. You had a decision to make didn't you?"

Steeringoo's bladed wheels began to spin. "I'm not giving up—"

**BANG**.

"AIIEE!" Steeringoo's top right wheel went flying through the air and a squealing Sailor Moon and Sailor Venus came tumbling down into the flood control channel as the appendage soared right where their heads had been.

**BANG**. **BANG**.

Her remaining wheels flew through the air and Sailors Uranus and Neptune nimbly slide down to avoid the shrapnel.

"You… You…" Steeringoo staggered and swayed on her feet. Her eyes were glazed over with pain as oil flowed sluggishly from the broken axels on her body. She shivered, her breath coming out in a light mist as the sludge that was her blood slowed to a trickle, the open wounds frozen over. "What did… you do… to me…?"

Archer lowered the Gatling gun, which he affectionately referred to as _the Big Bad_, as he spoke to the daimon.

"A bullet is meant for an instant death… but these bullets of mine are special. They aren't made of metal as I'm sure you've noticed." He gestured at Steeringoo's open wounds that were even now beginning to slowly freeze over with a thick layer of frost. "They are made of hoarfrost, the oldest of winter's ice. Once they pierce your skin, no matter where they hit, you're dead. The cold will spread their bitter hold throughout your body until you become a frozen corpse from the inside out."

"Yo-You…!" She had to run. She knew she couldn't get far, not if Archer's words were true, but she had to succeed in her mission! Steeringo turned and began to run and though she was without her wheels, she wasn't any slower without them.

"She's getting away!" exclaimed Sailor Venus.

"No. She's just making this fun." A faint click and a whirring of gears and a long rifle sprung out from Archer's back and falling to rest just above his right shoulder. While it could, at best, be described as a futuristic looking rifle, _the Cocytus_, as it was so named by its bearer, was no mere thing as a gun. In simple terms, the Cocytus is a rail gun, which means that when it fires its solitary bullet, it does so by launching the projectile at 2.4 kilometers per second.

In other words, by breaking the sound barrier not twice or thrice but _seven times_.

"**_Winter's Howl._**"

Whether it was the magic of Archer or that of the Senshi that muffled the blast of Cocytus to such a degree that only the windows within a three-block radius were shattered into dust and the girls' hearing was damaged for a mere moment or two.

As for Steeringoo herself…

It came to her as a sudden flash of emptiness and as she blinked in surprise, she wondered at the sight of her legs crumbling to bits before her as they continued to run without her upper body connected to them. Her mouth opened wide in a scream but no such sound emerged as the bitter cold swallowed her whole. Almost within the same instant, both her upper and lower body morphed back into the remains of the car that she had arisen from. The pure heart crystal emerged from the wreckage.

A gust of winter's wind and Archer slid along the trail of ice to the wrecked automobile, with his one hand outstretched to hold the crystal in his grasp.

"H-Hey! Give that here!" demanded Sailor Uranus.

"We need to check if that crystal holds a talisman!" said Sailor Neptune.

Archer stiffened and the Cocytus whirled to target the tiny bit of space between the pair. "Do not think to order me _traitorous scum._ Even if this crystal contained a talisman, I wouldn't hand it over to a pair of backstabbing _oath-breakers_ especially not to you of the Outer Senshi."

"Outer Senshi…?" muttered Sailor Moon before a faint noise drew her eyes upwards. "Eep!"

Sailor Uranus grit her teeth and an orb of energy alighted in her fist when Sailor Neptune suddenly grasped her shoulder tightly. She turned an angry glare to her partner but blinked in surprise when she found the shorter Senshi's eyes were aimed elsewhere. Following her gaze, Sailor Uranus' face paled slightly.

"Wow… That's a lot of dogs…" murmured Sailor Venus. Sailor Moon, just as intimidated by the sudden arrival of the monstrously large pack, nodded wordlessly.

Like Saber before him, an unprecedented number of a particular species of animal had come to answer the silent call to arms. Every known breed of dog that ran wild or tamed in the entirety of Japan was present on the roads running parallel to the flood control channel. From tiny pups to full grown mutts, well over a dozen slobbering fangs glistened in the daylight as the air trembled to the symphony of lupine throats growling almost as one.

"If that's all, I've got better things to do with my time." Archer kneeled low and leapt upwards into the sky. He landed gracefully upon the road and took off in a fast run. The gathered pack turned as one and followed in quick pursuit, their furious growls turning into jubilant howls as they made a merry chase down the streets of Juuban.

* * *

Usagi casually sipped her drink as she regarded the ceiling, while Minako, Rei, and Makoto embarrassed themselves over their discovering, or rediscovering in Minako's case, the short-haired blonde's true gender. Distracted though she had been, both by the foreign boy's words and behavior, especially in concern to Haruka, Usagi couldn't miss the fact that, much as she Minako saw a potential "bromance" between the pair, it was quite obvious that Haruka was not only a girl but her interest played for "the home team" as it were.

Not that it stopped the bun-haired blonde from her own potential "bromance" daydreams involving Mamoru and Motoki but that's hardly the point.

"Hey Ami," she spoke to the bluenette, the only one of the girls not busy trying to remove their feet from their mouths. "Do you know someone named Eirik Ejnar?"

"Hm? No… I can't say that I do… Why?"

"Really? The guy really seemed to know you!" Usagi giggled girlishly as she remembered, "He called you "Mizu-chan"!"

"… Mizu-chan?" For a moment, just a single instant in time, Ami Mizuno's eyes were vacant of their usual light as a memory, quick as lightning and twice as disorientating, came and went across her mind's eye. Within the same breath, the sudden reclamation was gone and Ami blinked confusedly as she shook her head. "I'm sorry but… I really don't remember."

It was all so fast no human eyes could possibly have seen it.

But no one ever said that Eirik Ejnar is human.

Even standing on the sidewalk with the busy street and tinted windows between them, he had seen the abrupt change in Ami's visage and how quickly the burst of memory was buried once more. His fist clenched tightly as the memory came unbidden in his mind. A young girl, no older than five, screaming in fear as a boy a few years her senior writhed in agony. The sound of bones breaking and shattered into splinters, the feeling of muscle and skin being ripped asunder.

Lightning flashed in the sky above and the prepared passerby opened their umbrellas and the rest run for appropriate cover, but not Eirik. He stood as the rain began to pour in a vicious torrent upon him. Laughter, dark and wicked, as an innocent soul solidified a primordial bargain once more…

"They really don't remember…" Blood dribbled from his tightly clenched fist. "She really doesn't remember…"

Eirik turned away and started off for home, convincing himself that the wetness trailing down from his eyes was from the rain and not the shattered remains of his heart.

Somewhere in the distance, a wolf howled…

* * *

Ami sat by herself in the park, staring despondently at her feet. She was depressed, he could practically taste it as he approached her carefully —cautiously— as though she were a deer he was about to pounce upon. Yet he had no such intention to hurt her let alone kill her.

He'd sooner kill himself than harm her.

"You look like a girl with troubles on the mind." He sat down at her right, regarding her with concerned rustic eyes. "Now, I'm no doctor, but I've come to find that the best cure for such ailment is a willing ear to listen and I just so happen to have a pair…"

Ami couldn't help a small smile but she did not have the heart to giggle at his attempt at humor. "It's silly…"

"Can't really agree or disagree with you." He shrugged. "But I can promise you that no matter what, I won't laugh. My doctor used to tell me I've a serious lack of a funny bone though I've a humerus pair." This time, Ami did giggle and the lad smiled like he had just won the lottery. "So, you gonna tell me what's bothering you or do I have to pull out a few more bad jokes?"

"No, it's okay…" Ami coughed, slightly embarrassed that she had laughed at so ridiculous a joke. "It's just… I've been thinking a lot lately… My mother is a doctor so I decided at an early age that I wanted to be a doctor too. I've studied for years without a doubt to become one. I thought that becoming a good doctor was my dream but…"

"But…?" he prompted.

"I've been feeling that I have no dream at all."

"Why do you think that?" He asked, sounding quite surprised to hear such words from her. "Becoming a doctor sounds like a good dream to me."

"But it feels more like a plan than a dream you know? People with dreams from the heart are fueled by passion and spirit. The only thing I have is academics, I can't become a good doctor like that."

"That'd be a damned shame if you ask me." He smiled, revealing sharper than average canines. "If I had a cute doctor like you, I think I could actually stand getting a shot."

Ami's face colored itself a rosy pink at being called cute but she giggled at the tough looking young man being afraid of needles. "You dislike getting shots?"

"I tend to run screaming at the sight of them truth be told." He chuckled and he regarded with a lidded gaze. _Though with you I might actually come running… _As she giggled, he asked, "Feeling better now?"

She smiled and nodded. "A bit better, thank you."

"Glad to have helped, Ami." He said, rising to his feet and turned back the way he had come. Ami turned and watched him go, her eyes falling upon the empty sleeve of his coat. Her eyes widened as she realized that she had never once introduced herself to the boy and she hastily called out to him.

"Who are you?"

He paused. Though she could not see it, he had a wretched expression on his face, as though her words had stabbed him straight through the heart.

"… Nobody important." He continued on, never once looking back, which was too bad really… If he had, he might have seen Ami's lips move soundlessly of their own accord, mouthing a single name.

"…Eirik?"

* * *

Having only attacked four people thus far, it can be understandable that the Death Busters and their daimon had not yet learned the faint line they should never cross under any circumstances. After all, only one of their victims was anyone of great importance and, being the first daimon to appear, was dealt with swift vengeance on wings of obsidian steel. Saber had been merciful in a way to the daimon Mikuji. He had allowed her to experience pain only long enough to make his point to Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune. He could have made it much worse for Mikuji, but he hadn't. Great though his anger was at the daimon, his concern for Rei was greater and he cared more for her safety than for her vengeance.

Sadly, such sentiment is not shared amongst the other Servants of Terra.

For though Sailor Moon had arrived to try and halt the assault, the aquatic daimon Dolvin would not be stopped by pretty speeches and had successfully secured Sailor Moon via a slowly tightening floatation ring before she fully removed the pure heart crystal of Ami Mizuno.

Much as Rei Hino before her, Ami's heart crystal shone with a stronger radiance than most others but unlike Rei's, whose crystal was almost akin to a ruby with its vivid red glow, Ami's heart crystal was that of a sapphire, shining blue like the sea.

Kaorinite was elated by the crystal and hastily took it from the daimon's clutches but her witches sight revealed that, though powerful, this crystalized pure heart did not contain a talisman. And then she made one of the worst mistakes in her entire life. She raised the crystal high, preparing to bring it smashing down on the ground.

**BANG.**

The glass window behind her shattered into wintry frost and Dolvin found herself without a right hand. The daimon screamed, water gushing out of her wrist as it slowly begun to freeze over.

**BANG.**

Dovlin's left hand joined her right and the daimon collapsed onto her back. The viscous waters flowing from her arms solidified fully into ice and trapped Dolvin to the floor.

**BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG. **

The daimon screamed her scratchy voice raw as bullet holes speared up along her legs, dissolving them into water that quickly flash froze into ice. Though not truly an organic creature considering that Dolvin's form was birthed from pool water she, like all of her sisters before and the many more to follow, could conceive pain. It was the only way for them to be able to properly defend themselves should they come under attack, so they could fight efficiently without hindering themselves by worsening, or even self-inflicting, their injuries.

That didn't stop Kaorinite from paling further as the daimon turned to her and screamed, "MAKE IT STOP! PLEASE MAKE THE PAIN STOP!"

**BANG.**

It was instinct that saved Kaorinite's life that day. Just as the bullet meant for her heart was fired, she vanished in a hasty teleport, leaving Ami's heart crystal to fall through air and be carried amidst a flurry of snowflakes from the bullet's passing. Another sudden gust of snow and it was gently caught in the hand of Archer. He regarded the pure heart crystal in silence for a moment before turning sharply to Dolvin.

"You want the pain to end?"

**BANG.**

"AUGH!" screamed Dolvin as the Big Bad fired into her left shoulder, her arm melting into water and quickly freezing over into ice.

"Don't worry. The pain will end. When I'm good and ready."

**BANG. **

"AAAH!" Her right shoulder blasted to pieces. "No! Please, have mercy—!"

"Shut up!" He kicked her hard in the torso, shattering the ice that was formerly her limbs and sending her sliding across the room. "I ain't Saber! You hurt one of mine and I'll be damned if I don't see you _suffer_ for it!"

The Big Bad rose once more.

"Stop it!" Sailor Moon cried out. "Please! Ami, she's—She'll die if you don't give her back her pure heart!"

Just like that, Archer's fury was doused and he turned sharply to see that though the hardened waters that held her were gone at Dolvin's loss of limbs and control, Ami was lying on the floor with glazed eyes and rapidly graying skin. He looked down upon the crystal in his hand and saw its light was slowly beginning to dim.

"No… No!" Archer was at her side, his hand holding out her pure heart crystal as he begged, "Not again, don't do this to me again! I can't do this a second time!"

The pure heart crystal flashed with azure brilliance before it floated free from Archer's grasp and fell once more into the breast from whence it was born. Ami gasped and the light returned once more to her eyes.

Archer's head bowed low. He turned to regard Dolvin and slowly rose to his feet. He walked across the silent room to her and stood above her. The daimon looked up at him with tears glimmering in artificial eyes. "Is… it over?"

"… Yes. This is when the pain stops…"

**BANG.**

* * *

Artemis walked along the fence to Luna and sat at her side without a word. The white cat looked upwards to the moon and asked, "How's Usagi?"

Luna sighed. "Shaken but I think she'll be alright. I think she was more surprised by Archer's words than his actions today."

"They were rather telling weren't they?" Artemis turned to regard her. "Does Ami…?"

"No." Luna shook her head. "Neither she or Rei have any idea."

"… Is that good or bad?" Artemis wondered. "Clearly the Servants remember but…"

"But they are different now. In ways I could not possibly have imagined."

Artemis smiled though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "If such weaponry existed back during the Silver Millennium, I have no doubt that Archer would have gotten his hands on them regardless of… everything. Still…" Artemis sighed. "The more that things change the more they stay the same in some ways. You saw how Archer acted when Ami's life was threatened."

"Yes…" Luna shot her companion a deadpan look. "And I also saw what he did to the daimon. He could have killed it on the first shot, you _know_ that he could have but he didn't. He wanted to torture that daimon for what it had done, regardless of the innocent eyes watching such abhorrent actions…"

"… I can't say that I blame him though."

Luna turned sharply to Artemis, an incredulous gape on her feline face. "What?"

"I… Look, if the circumstances were different, if it were me in Archer's place and you in Ami's… I can't honestly say that I wouldn't have done something similar as what Archer had done. He wanted vengeance, that can't be denied, but you saw what he had done to that red-haired witch didn't you? He _frightened _her. He showed her that he would kill her easily and I think he would have if he didn't fear for Ami's pure heart crystal."

Luna's eyes narrowed, her disbelief obvious in her eyes and tone. "So that's it then? He was trying to send a message and that excuses his actions? If that were a human—"

"But it _wasn't_ Luna." Artemis rose and turned towards home but paused. "And it wasn't a human back then either. Regardless of what Queen Serenity believed…"

* * *

_To be continued..._

* * *

_**Next time...**_

**_Sneak_**

"_Men fear death, as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other._"


	4. 03: Sneak

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

* * *

**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

* * *

03: Sneak

"_Men fear death, as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other._"

It can be argued that even the most soft spoken of girls can find herself shouting to the highest pillars of Heaven itself when presented in a situation they find entirely uncomfortable no matter how much they daydreamed otherwise. Such was the case and then some for one Usagi Tsukino when pressed by her waitress friend Unazuki on whether or not Usagi and Mamoru had kissed.

Sitting on the table opposite them, Horatio winced and rubbed at his ear while his friend, who was unfortunate enough to sit just behind the loud blonde, merely frowned. Lightly tanned with his ebony hair tied into a small ponytail on the back of his neck, the lad was clearly a few years younger than Horatio and fully Japanese to boot. He wore rather plain clothes, a simple pair of jeans and plain white shirt beneath a well-worn leather jacket. He'd easily get lost in a crowd despite the glimmering purple of his eyes beneath his small pair of square-shaped spectacles. He scratched at his neck, just beneath the choker wrapped tightly over what could only be a nasty scar.

It would have to be considering that Arashi Tomoe is mute.

Playing with the kunai-shaped pendant dangling from his choker, the younger boy looked imploringly to his older compatriot.

"You're the one who insisted on seeing her for yourself. Not my fault that she didn't keep her demure nature."

Arashi rolled his eyes and pulled out a small PDA as the girls continued to converse behind him. He started typing upon it but suddenly stopped even as Horatio's fists clenched tightly. The pair looked out the corner of their eyes at the two newcomers into the small restaurant before regarding each other. Arashi pressed the delete key on his PDA and hastily retyped a new message.

Usagi exclaimed her surprise at hearing that Unazuki, so interested in learning whether Usagi and Mamoru had reached "first base", hadn't even truly "gone up to bat" as it were though she had a boyfriend herself. The brunette went on to explain that she wanted her first kiss to be something special, to make it as absolutely perfect as possible. Right then, Arashi finished typing and, with a small smirk, turned up the volume.

"_Kisses kept are wasted; love is to be tasted. There are some you love, I know; be not loath to tell them so. Lips go dry and eyes grow wet, waiting to be warmly met. Keep them not in waiting yet; kisses kept are wasted._" The PDA's electronic voice, sounding remarkably human if a bit distorted with a slight electronic undertone, recited. The two girls' turned to the pair of boys.

Horatio sweat-dropped at their sudden scrutiny and shook his head. "Forgive my friend here. He considers himself an expert in all things to do with romance and well, you both were rather loud, I'm sorry to say."

Unazuki blushed to the roots of her hair at having been so easily overheard, by a pair of cute boy's no less, while Usagi peered curiously at them, Horatio most particular. "… Have we met? I swear I've seen you somewhere before…"

He chuckled and twisted in his seat to stick out of his leg and tapped at the brace adorning it with his cane. "You might have run into me trying to work up the courage to walk up Hikawa Shrine's stairs more than once. Quite literally the last time too. The climb is no small feat for one such as me but I hear the lady atop is more than worth the effort."

Usagi's embarrassed flush quickly vanished as she blinked in confusion at the Native American's words.

"_In other words, he's a crush on the priestess and is still working up the nerve to speak with her._" Arashi smirked at Horatio's embarrassed flush and, noting Usagi's confusion, hastily typed out on his PDA. "_Like Horatio and Eirik, I too am not without my own injuries. I'm mute and though I know sign language, I'm afraid that not many others do._"

Usagi blinked again, this time in surprise. "You know Eirik? Are you two his friends?"

It was too quick for either girls, or the nearby eavesdroppers to notice, but Horatio sent a subtle glare Arashi's way, which was readily ignored as he answered, "_Yes, we're acquainted through the same program._"

Before Usagi could question Arashi on that, Horatio hastily butted back in to the conversation. "Oh, where are my manners today? My name is Horatio Alexander and this is—"

"_Arashi Tomoe. A pleasure to meet you._"

"Did you really mean that?" Unazuki suddenly asked, much to the confusion of the three who blinked perplexedly at her. Blushing slightly, she amended, "That poem earlier… About kept kisses are wasted?"

Arashi nodded.

"But… aren't first kisses supposed to be special? Done in the right place at the right moment?"

"_No matter the circumstances behind it, a first kiss is something you'll always remember but… A moment please._" Arashi spent a bit more time typing something out before his PDA started to recite another poem. "_Give me a kiss, and to that kiss a score. Then to that twenty, add a hundred more: a thousand to that hundred: so kiss on, to make that thousand up a million. Treble that million and when that is done, let's kiss afresh, as when we first begun._"

Horatio's expression darkened for a moment before he chuckled at the girls' gob-smacked expressions. "In layman's terms, kiss as often as you like, but treat every kiss as your first."

Arashi nodded and finished off his drink before rising from the table revealing that he was barely any taller than Usagi at best. He signed at Horatio before bowing to the two girls and heading out of the restaurant.

"That was a quick exit," muttered Usagi, rather surprised that the boy had run off as he had.

"Arashi's patience is not often considered a virtue as it is a vice even at the best of times." Horatio said before he slowly rose to his feet. He hand a few yen notes to Unazuki. "For the meal and the show."

He walked away ignoring the looks sent his way as he shuffled out the door though he couldn't help the smirk on his face when he heard a patron complain of a missing wallet shortly before Unazuki proclaimed the generous tip she had just received. He turned serious though when he glanced at the shadowed alleyway.

"That was stupid of you. I thought that we all agreed to not try and bring any more attention to ourselves in our civilian guises."

Arashi emerged from the shadows and his demeanor was entirely opposite of what it had been in the restaurant. Within, he had been smiling with warm eyes but out here, away from the unknowingly gathered Senshi, he was scowling and his eyes could make even Archer's ice seem molten hot by comparison.

He angrily signed at Horatio, "_I was not about to let those two try and discover the truth hiding in plain sight. Don't tell me you were willing to let them figure out just who Sailor Moon truly is?_"

"… No." Horatio sighed as he recalled the disturbingly close presence of the two Outers in their civilian guises, "If you hadn't said something I would have." His eyes narrowed dangerously upon the shorter boy as a few ravens landed upon the rooftops nearby. "But using one of my poems to my Lady? That was low Arashi, even for someone like you."

The Japanese boy's demeanor hardly cracked but he did glance away from Horatio and did not deign to reply.

Horatio sighed and shook his head. "Look, I understand how you feel but—"

A lengthy acupuncture needle flew past Horatio's ear and imbedded itself fully into the wall behind him. Arashi glared hatefully upon Horatio as he signed, "_The fuck that you do! You and the others haven't even dared to try! I did and look where that got me! Look at what I had to do to protect her!_"

The shadows behind Arashi moved like rippling waters and Horatio's grip on his cane tightened as swarms of miniature eyes opened in the blackness and glared spitefully upon him. Above and around the Native American youth, the ravens stirred their feathers and clacked their beaks but did not deign to retreat even as the tide swelled larger.

"_When she remembers, and I promise you that she will regardless of the Plan, she'll remember all that was stolen from her, in this life and the last … When she does, she'll hate me with even more passion than when she had once loved me and foolishly agreed to this madness… So no. Not you, not any one of you, know the pain I'm going through right now because none of you have dared to try and love them again as you had once before!_"

"They are not the same!" shouted Horatio, prodding the younger boy back into the darkness of the alleyways with his cane and shuffling after him as the gathered ravens took off and the gathered masses retreated under his advance. "They are not the same people from all those years ago!"

"_Neither are WE! Damn it, I know that Tobias can't but surely you can see it Horatio? Look at me! Look at yourself! We are not the same either! Our souls might have survived the transition through time but not much else did! Where is our valor? Where is our courage? Instead of letting the wind carry you away from Lady Aries why don't you just try and push it back for once?!_"

He turned and vanished into the alleyway and Horatio did not bother to try and pursue him. Because no matter how much he wanted to say otherwise…

He agreed with Arashi.

"To push back the wind… To change the way that it blows, to force it back… To not accept what it brings… Is such a thing possible?" He whispered to himself. "I do want to push back the wind… but I…"

"Caw…?" A familiar pair of ravens settled upon Horatio's shoulders. His grip tightened upon his cane.

"… But I'm not too scared to try."

* * *

Osoji was quite different from her elder daimon brethren. For one thing, she had been born from a machine much like Steeringoo but whereas the automobile-born daimon was geared entirely towards speed and evasion, Osoji was given a particularly unique set of enhancements. One of these enhancements was the ability to locate and track down pure heart crystals given the frequency of interference by the Sailor Senshi and the risk of one snatching the crystal back. This radar-like system was also meant as the daimon's self-defense against _them_. Though they knew no name for them, the Death Busters had a name for those who made a mockery of the daimon with their inhuman brutality.

_The Dark Knights._

Standing atop a large garbage pile in the middle of Juuban's junkyard, Osoji had every right to sneer with confidence down upon the down Sailor Senshi at the foot of the mountainous heap. Though Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus had matched her in the mad dash to find the lost pure heart crystal and Sailor Moon had made quite the pretty little speech, that didn't stop Osoji from getting the upper hand, or vacuum as the case was.

Best of all, there was no sign of Saber or Archer!

**SQUELCH!**

"Huh…?" Osoji glanced down and was surprised to see the pure heart crystal resting in another's hand. A hand that was attached to an arm that was jutting out from the middle of her chest, ivory tinted armor glistening beneath the blackened oil that served as the daimon's blood.

Bladed tips pierced through Osoji's shoulders and before the daimon had the chance to scream, she was torn in half, her broken pieces collapsing into the vacuum that she had arisen from.

"I'm sorry but that was just getting obscene. I mean, "Eat my dust"? _Really?_" The Ivory Knight crouched low, resting his head upon the back of one fist as he regarded the Senshi below. Quite the polar opposite to Saber, his armor and bodysuit was almost entirely white and what edges and intricate, almost web-like designs, that weren't consisted of a vibrant azure. In fact, the only thing about him that wasn't entirely white are the black ovular coverings over his red lenses, which were cut in such a way that he appeared to have not one but _four _pairs of eyes. Upon his back were two pairs of bio-metallic spider legs, both equally proportionate to what a spider's own would be if the spider in question were the size of a human being. The two lower legs were clutched tightly around his torso, aiming up into the center of his chest while the upper pair lowered themselves down to complete the X-shape. Upon his neck was a simple choker with a diamond shaped pendant dangling beneath it.

Sailor Moon shivered at the sight of the Arachnid Warrior, not just by his insect-like appearance but the memory of Archer's brutality was still fresh in the young girl's mind. But she had other priorities to concern herself over as she remembered just whose heart crystal it was in resting in the Ivory Knight's hand. "Oh no! Unazuki's pure heart crystal!"

She raced for it, not intending to fight the Arachnid Warrior for it but to plead with him to give it to her, but Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune did not see it that way.

"I won't let you have it!" cried Sailor Neptune, leaping past Sailor Moon as Sailor Uranus tackled her from behind, putting her in a chokehold just as she reached the foot of the junk pile.

"We will take the talisman!" Sailor Uranus spoke harshly to Sailor Moon as she pulled her back.

Sailor Neptune landed beside the Arachnid Warrior, intending to fight him for the crystal if need be, but he seemed frozen on the spot as he stared down at the struggling Sailor Moon. He turned his head slowly to face Sailor Neptune. The Arachnid Warrior's voice was strange, a queer distortion like he was speaking from deep within a cave rather than in the open, if not utterly filthy, grounds of the junkyard.

"Do you think it so easy to sneak up on the likes of me? For all you know, I'm already down there." Sailor Uranus froze as she felt a blade press its pointed tip upon the base of her skull, the Ivory Knight's strange voice whispering into her ear. "With a blade aimed straight into that murderous little head of yours!"

Sailor Neptune blinked at the suddenly vacant space atop the pile and looked down. "Sailor Uranus!"

"I thought you'd have learned your lesson from Archer," said the Ivory Knight. "Did you think him alone in his opinions? That the rest of us would have a different sentiment, that we would let you run rampant as you wish without repercussion? Saber's sword would take you down before you even realize its been drawn. Archer would make you dance as his bullets sing the song of your demise before he puts one between your eyes."

And for a brief horrifying moment the two Outer Senshi could see it happening right before their eyes. Saber swooping down from the heavens on wings of obsidian steel his sword tearing the whole sky asunder with but a single swing. Archer standing atop Tokyo Tower, Gatling gun blazing and sending a storm of bullets before growing weary of the game and finishing them off with two simple shots from the rail gun on his back.

Even Sailor Moon was not immune to witnessing these visions but whereas Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus saw the events unfolding through their own eyes and the demise of their partner before their own, Sailor Moon watched as an outsider, her viewpoint that of an unseen angel in the sky above the bloodied battlegrounds that the Ivory Knight was painting.

"But me? You won't even see me coming. Why? Because I am not Saber, coming from the front. I am not Archer, attacking you from afar. I am Assassin and when I strike it is always right when you least expect it."

And as quickly as it had started, the story was over and Sailor Moon found herself standing beside Assassin, her hands occupied by the pure heart crystal once in his own grasp. His head tilted and Sailor Moon could almost swear that he was smiling beneath his helmet. "But as I said, I'm not like Archer or Saber, and I don't feel like fighting you when I don't have to. So take that heart crystal back to whom it belongs, Princess. This crystal doesn't have what those two are hoping to find."

Sailor Moon looked back and forth between the heart crystal and Assassin, and surprised the Ivory Knight when she reached up with one arm and gave him a quick hug. "Thank you!"

And she was away, faster than anyone would ever have thought possible of her.

Assassin watched her go and for a moment, he seemed almost tranquil, at peace with some inner demon that he was struggling to overcome throughout the entire confrontation. Then, his fists clenched tightly and he turned sharply to glare down at the two Outer Senshi, still recovering from the illusionary assault he had unleashed upon them.

"You two have _no idea_ how fortunate it was that it was I and not any of the others that were here to witness this… this _travesty!_ Be grateful of your good luck because I promise you, the next time you feel a knife on your neck, I guarantee that blood will be spilt."

Assassin's arachnid legs uncurled and with but a single leap, he was gone.

* * *

In the darkness of a misbegotten pit of dreadful souls, an entire wall's worth of monitors slowly came to life until the entire fixture was a mass of static white. A simple click of a button, an image appeared in the central most television screen before it spread like wildfire across the multitude of squares. A series of clips began to play, showing off five familiar Senshi using their strongest attacks.

"The five Sailor Senshi… They are most bothersome…"

The clips were replaced by a single still image of a pair, the Outer Senshi standing side by side as they sneered down at friend and enemy alike.

"Then there are these characters, the ones calling themselves Neptune and Uranus… They are after the talismans just as we are."

Kaorinite stood in silence as her professor spoke from wherever he resided in the darkness. She had a calm façade as she regarded the image of the two Senshi, for though they were quite the troublesome pair; they had not yet earned more than a scholarly curiosity from the red-haired witch.

"Perhaps they know our plan of attack given the frequency of their arriving mere moments after our daimon emerge…"

"Yet these even these two are of little consequence compared to them!" The Professor continued on as though he hadn't heard Kaorinite. A click and the images changed once more to a series of clips and Kaorinite took a step back and bit down hard on her lower lip to keep from screaming aloud.

It was _them_…

"Though we've yet to see them for beyond a few instances, it is quite clear that these—these _knights_ have a clear disfavor of Uranus and Neptune… Because we can use this to our advantage…"

"Professor?"

"Yes… Yes that's it exactly! It will be like killing two birds with one stone! Lure them out Kaorinite and annihilate them!"

* * *

Assassin watched in the canopy of the forest as the newest daimon to come out of the Death Busters' labs made short work of Sailor Neptune before moving on to Sailor Uranus. He didn't know what disturbed him more, that he was actually feeling _sympathy_ for the two traitors or the appearance of the, apparently twinned daimon Tiren. While the daimon thus far have all been female and somewhat provocative, Assassin had absolutely no idea what to make of this one aside from disgust.

"For crying out loud, it looks like a damned purple latex bodysuit with equally bad colored wig and accessories. How is _that_ supposed to intimidate anything? Merciful Light, she better not have been in charge of that one's design or I swear I'll die of shame right here and now…" He muttered to himself. He shook his head, smiling beneath his helmet. "Still, there's something to be said in watching those two get their long waiting comeuppance."

It was right then that Sailor Moon entered the fray and between their arguing over who should be the one fleeing with injured comrade and who should mind her own damned business, failed to realize how easily they were setting up the witch's trap.

_"I don't care what happens to those two but she MUST BE PROTECTED. Do I make myself clear?" _grumbled the echo of Dirk's voice in Assassin's mind.

"… Transparently…" Assassin leapt from the forest tree tops and landed between the two Senshi.

"You!" exclaimed Sailor Uranus in anger.

"Assassin!" cried Sailor Moon in surprise and… relief? The Ivory Knight spared a glance at the pony-tailed blonde and that one second's hesitation was just enough for the daimon twins.

"**_Chain Ring!_**"

The red visors of Assassin's helmet brightened slightly as he slowly glared down at his wrists and what shackled them to Sailor Moon and Sailor Uranus. Somewhere in the vicinity of Juuban, he was certain a certain gun-toting maniac was laughing his ass off at that very moment to which Assassin had only one thing to say.

"… Oh _FUCK_ me."

The Tirens cackled with glee and converted themselves into their wheeled forms and shot towards the chained trio. Assassin proudly stood his ground ready to face them down but the two Senshi leapt in opposite directions and ended up sending all three of them to the ground. Assassin uttered a series of oaths that left Sailor Moon blushing a vibrant pinkish hue as his spider-legs launched them up into the air just in time to avoid the daimon twins. Unfortunately, with the added weight of two women strapped to his arms, Assassin did not get as far as he intended and came crashing back to the earth with the Senshi colliding on top of him.

Kaorinite actually had the audacity to laugh.

"Uranus, run! You have to survive to continue the mission!"

"Fine by me!" snapped Assassin, his spider legs lifting him and the two Senshi strapped to his wrists up into the air. "Laugh while you can witch! As soon I remove this dead weight from my arm, I'm coming for you next!"

Kaorinite laughed and she kicked Sailor Neptune hard in the ribs, sending the injured Senshi tumbling over the cliff and into the raging waters of the waterfall where she disappeared from sight.

"Neptune!" cried Sailor Uranus, heartbreak evident in her voice. Assassin cursed and turned the opposite way and started for the forest, his bio-metallic arachnid legs giving him a greater burst of speed even with the extra weight attached to him.

"Wait!" yelled Sailor Moon, "The waterfall is the other way! We have to go back!"

Assassin ignored her as he continued to run, his teeth clenching tightly as he bit back the urge to turn right back around and lay waste to the Tirens, regardless of the harm he'd let befall the girl attached to his right arm. The shame of retreat was one that would be damned near impossible for him to clean off but he was sure that witch's blood was a good enough cleanser as any.

* * *

**CLANG!**

"Fuck!"

**CLANG!**

"This!"

**CLANG!**

"Horse!"

**CLANG!**

"SHIT!" Assassin roared as his upper arachnid legs bounced off the chains with enough force to send him falling flat on his back. Sailor Moon looked concerned at the Ivory Knight, silently grateful that he had aimed his attempts at the arm not chained to her own, while Sailor Uranus looked quite unimpressed.

"Well you're just full of it aren't you?" she said, sarcasm dripping like ice in her voice. "Any other bright ideas you want to see fail?"

"Shut up, wretch. I am not Archer," snarled Assassin as he sat himself upright, his lenses almost entirely aglow in the darkness of the cave he had dragged the Senshi in to escape the pursuing daimon twins. "I do not possess the Gift of Freedom! Much as I want to be free from your company, the only feasible means I can come up with to rid myself of your attachment is by cleaving your arm clean off, an idea that your attitude is rapidly enticing."

Sailor Uranus held up her other hand, a familiar orange light beginning to shine through her clenched fingers. "At this range, I think I can manage to take you down with me!"

"Stop it!" shouted Sailor Moon, "Stop fighting! How can you two be fighting with each other like this, especially you Sailor Uranus! Sailor Neptune could still be alive, why didn't you want to go back and save her?"

"If we go out there like this, they'll kill us." Sailor Uranus argued.

Assassin merely scoffed, "Just you. I think you're body will make a good meat shield personally."

Sailor Uranus shivered as the image appeared before her of Assassin doing just that and she snapped at him, "Shut up!"

"I'm just telling you how it is," said the Arachnid Warrior. "Be grateful that I didn't just cut your arm off and dump you into the same river as Neptune. At least then you'd share the same grave with your lover."

Sailor Moon looked away from the two, whispering quietly to herself. "You both are cruel hearted people."

To her surprise, both Assassin and Sailor Uranus responded at the same time, "What do you know?!"

She looked up and saw that the two were standing up and glaring down upon her. Uranus was the first to break and turned her back upon Sailor Moon as she spoke, "Neptune and I made a promise, that we wouldn't let our emotions get in the way of our mission. That even if one of us must die to do so, the other must continue to try and find the talismans."

"Do you have to go that far for your mission? Just what are these talismans anyway?" asked Sailor Moon.

"I don't have to tell you," said Sailor Uranus, obstinately looking away from the shorter blonde.

"How can you be so cold?!" demanded Sailor Moon. "People whose pure hearts are stolen from them all suffer and could even die! Why?!"

"Because Silence is coming."

Both Senshi turned to Assassin, one with confusion in her eyes and the other with surprise.

"Those who are behind the daimons, the ones your Inners call "Heart Snatchers" have a different name for themselves. They call themselves DEATH Busters and they seek the talismans to stop the release of one of the few means of defense against the true power behind the daimons. Their… progenitor I suppose you could call it." He scoffed and glanced towards Uranus. "However, the traitor and her cohort here are also after the talismans for the exact opposite reason despite both their inability to actually release the talismans at all never mind using them to their advantage!"

"Who _are_ you?" whispered Sailor Moon.

"I am Assassin of the Fabled Spider, a Servant of… Well, you have someone else that you can ask about that." He shrugged. "We are another means. That's all that you need to know."

"Bull shit! You… How could you possibly know all that?! Do you have someone on the inside!? Do you serve these DEATH Busters!?" demanded Sailor Uranus. "Tell me!"

"I don't have to tell you _shit!_ You and your backstabbing _whore_—"

Smack.

Assassin blinked and slowly tilted his head at Sailor Uranus who held her hand with painful grimace. "… Once upon a time, that would have taken my head clean off… How the mighty Senshi have fallen…" He sighed and glanced askance at Sailor Moon. "…And now she's reopened her wound."

"She what? Oh no!" Sailor Moon reached around in her subspace pocket and hastily pulled out a handkerchief. Putting herself between Assassin and Uranus, she clumsily tried to try tie it into a makeshift bandage around the taller Senshi's reddening shoulder.

"What are you—Don't touch me!" She snapped before turning a heated glare upon Assassin who held her arms in place. "Let go!"

"Either she does it or I do and trust me, you wouldn't like how I would wrap it."

"There! All better now right?" asked Sailor Moon, smiling gleefully at the rather crudely tied handkerchief.

Begrudgingly nodding in agreement, Sailor Uranus turned away from her. "… Thanks."

"Now that we've had our tender moment, I think I might have an idea of breaking these damnable chains…" He glanced once more at Sailor Moon. "For this to work though, I need you both to be still and, in your case, absolutely quiet. Do you understand? _Still and silent as the grave._"

"Uh… Okay?" said Sailor Moon.

Assassin nodded and looked at Uranus who huffed. "Fine… But this better work!"

"Good. Because honestly?" He looked once more at Sailor Moon, or rather, over her shoulder and into the depths of the cave. "I think your screaming will scare them more then they will you never mind how irritating it will be for me to have to explain cutting out your tongue."

_Them?_ Sailor Moon blinked and looked back into the cave. Her eyes widened to the size of saucers, her pupils shrinking down into miniscule dots, and her flesh rapidly paled into a sickly gray. To her credit, Sailor Uranus merely stiffened and developed a small quiver to her shoulders at what was approaching them from all directions.

Spiders.

From the floor to the walls to the ceiling to the open mouth of the cave, every square inch was _swarming_ with spiders.

"What are they doing…?" whispered Sailor Uranus as Sailor Moon had apparently retreated to her "happy place" at the sight of a legion's worth of arachnids. "Are they here to help?"

Assassin shook his head, inwardly amused at the notion that he would use spiders as a means of breaking a quartet of daimonic handcuffs. "No. They're here to watch. We Servants tend to… resonate… with certain species of life as you've already seen with Saber and Archer."

"Resonate…? That doesn't make any sense…"

"Is it not the same with you and the wind? Neptune and the sea?" He asked in return. "Now be silent. It'll take every ounce of my concentration to make sure I don't end up killing you both with these in my hands…"

Sailor Uranus turned to Assassin and saw that his once empty hands were now occupied by a pair of weapons that she vaguely recalled seeing on his person but not quite sure of where specifically. The two weapons in Assassin's grasp looked like a pair of double-bladed daggers, with curved blades of pristine white and gilded hilts of dark obsidian.

They are _the Neith_.

Assassin curled his arms tightly and took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The spiders appeared almost eager as they chittered quietly in the shadows, though those dangling from lines of webbing hastily climbed to safer heights. He slowly started to spin the daggers in his hands with ever increasing speed as _power_ began to build within the blades until he intoned it with a single command.

"**_Spring Calamity._**"

* * *

Kaorinite cringed and turned towards the forest. "What was—?"

A thick strand of something wrapped tightly around her throat and she was suddenly dragged downwards to the earth below. She tried to gasp for air but the rope tied tightly upon her throat offered no lax for more than what was necessary to keep her conscious. She landed with enough force to crater the earth beneath her and as she struggled for enough breath to scream, she looked up into the lensed eyes of her attacker.

Assassin.

"Let me tell you a story…" He yanked hard on the strand of webbing, which was no thicker than a cord but no weaker than titanium of the same circumference, sending her flying into a tree. "About a red-haired witch who thought it wise to mock an assassin."

She tried to teleport away but he yanked her towards him as her body started to flicker between the dimensions and punched her solidly in the face, sending her down into the dirt yet again.

"This is my only warning. You push me again as you did today and you will to deal with the real me and not just a figment of your nightmares, orders be damned."

He crouched down next to her and leaned close enough that all that Kaorinite could see were the eight lenses that so dreadfully resembled the eyes of a demonic spider.

"Run Kaorinite. Run back to Professor Tomoe and tell him that the Servants of Terra have returned."

The red-haired witch gasped for breath, her airway suddenly opened and unobstructed. Her hand reached to her throat, to find it clear of Assassin's webbing and after glancing about like a frightened deer, she realized that she hadn't even moved from her perch atop the highest tree in the forest. She reached out to the Tiren twins and wasn't surprised to feel the emptiness that awaited her call. She looked down at her hands and saw them trembling. She clenched them and tried to find some satisfaction that she had something new to report to the Professor at least. Her mockery had at least instilled enough anger in Assassin to reveal the name of his group after he had—

Her eyes widened.

Assassin…

He had called her _by name_.

The _Professor's name!_

He knew!

His entire group all knew!

Kaorinite would never know that her teleportation spell achieved new records in both the fastest execution and the most overpowered as she overshot the base by several kilometers.

* * *

_To be continued..._

* * *

_**Next time...**_

**_Crush_**

"_A human creature deprived of reason, and disordered in his senses, is still an animal, or instrument possessing strength and ability to commit violence; but he is no more so than a mere mechanical machine, which, when put in motion, performs its powerful operations on all that comes in its way, without consciousness of its own effects, or responsibility for them._"


	5. 04: Crush

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

* * *

**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

* * *

04: Crush

"_A human creature deprived of reason, and disordered in his senses, is still an animal, or instrument possessing strength and ability to commit violence; but he is no more so than a mere mechanical machine, which, when put in motion, performs its powerful operations on all that comes in its way, without consciousness of its own effects, or responsibility for them._"

There is something to be said of being statuesque in a country where the closest of the population barely reached one's shoulders. For one thing, it made going through the crowds all the easier when said mobs would all but throw themselves bodily out of one's way. It didn't help that this particular specimen, who was all of six feet and two inches in height and was dressed in a somewhat punkish style with thick heavy combat boots on his feet, fingerless gloves on his hands, and a leather jacket with a fur lined collar. Around his neck was a choker from which hung a pendant shaped like a lock. His golden brown hair was a crow's nest at best and a tangled thorn bush at worse but somehow, he managed the look well enough with the aid of a generous length of cloth tied around his forehead. A pair of reflective sunglasses rested upon his nose, the kind that clung close to his face to not allow even the slightest glimmer of the milky white of his eyes.

His name is Tobias Romano and he is blind.

Yet he could see the world clearly, far better he would argue, than anyone else.

He'd have to if he were to find her.

His ear twitched and he turned sharply, scaring the wits out of the nearby pedestrians at the sudden change in direction. He stood like a mountain in the middle of the sidewalk, heedless of the rushing waters of the passerby as he strained to catch that errant voice in the storm of noise.

… _Nothing._

"I mean it! When I first met you Mako-chan, I was thinking what a cute person you were!"

He turned once more, nearly beaning one poor sod upside the head with the tails of his bandana. _That's the Princess!_

He smiled in relief, thinking that his job was all the easier but that's when he smelled it.

An oak forest after a good storm and the faint charge of lightning…

His fists tightened and he struggled to control his face, his milky white eyes clenched tightly beneath his shades. He knew he would run into her eventually, he had planned this from the very onset of this foolhardy quest, and she was there, just on the opposite side of the street. He had wanted this.

So then why?

Why was he so afraid?

And then, her voice was heard and suddenly, he wasn't so afraid anymore.

"You're praising me too much, Usagi! But it makes me happy to hear it…"

His fingers loosened and for the first time since that rainy day so long ago, he smiled. _I didn't think that hearing your voice again would make me feel so… at peace with myself… My Lady…_

He heard the roar of a motorcycle engine above the faint ting of changing lights and he smelled the faint scent of rubber burning hot and hard against the asphalt thanks to the sharply increasing speed of twin wheels spinning fast. His feet were far ahead of his mouth, as he roared to the two girls loud enough to stop even the rampaging dead.

"Look out!"

The motorcyclist's tires screeched against the road as she skidded to a halt but it didn't matter, her would-have-been victims were safe from any harm on the shoulders of their savior. Usagi blinked rapidly and wondered why it was that she was suddenly so high in the air and turned to her left to see Makoto's face a familiar shade of pink, an expression the blonde would almost be resigned to see on her taller friend's face if it weren't almost warranted. For you see, both she and Makoto were quite literally held aloft upon the shoulders of their rescuer who looked back and forth between them with open concern on his face.

"Are you two alright? Do I need to call you an ambulance?" He turned about and roared at the motorcyclist who still sat astride on her bike, visibly indecisive. "Or maybe the police you stupid bitch! Last I checked red means—"

"Sempai?"

Tobias' rant halted and if life were an anime filled with background music, the record player would have scratched to an immediate and jarring halt. As this was reality and no such soundtrack existed, it was the muscular brunette's heart that suddenly came to a crashing stop. He kneeled down and let the two girls down gently upon their feet before rising to his full height before them. Usagi blinked and couldn't help the slight widening of her eyes at how ridiculously powerful this guy looked while Makoto, impossibly, became even more flushed.

"Is… Is that you…?"

His ears heard the words clearly, the disbelief and painfully aching hope in the voice. His nose smelled the waning anxiety born from an intense burst of fear and the slow rise of something more as blushed rushed fast and hot beneath soft, feminine skin. He wanted to reach out, to feel that familiar warmth beneath his fingers, but he bit back the urge.

She didn't remember him. She couldn't possibly. If she did, wouldn't she have called him—"Tobi-sempai?"

_By name…_

The world could have broken underneath his feet. The sky could have ruptured and flooded the world red with its blood. Every star in the night sky and every living body stitched from their arrangement could have ceased to be. All of that could have occurred in the same instance and so much more.

That still didn't stop Tobias from thinking that this moment, above all others in the current and past life, was the greatest of them all.

* * *

The massive mansion sitting solitarily at the end of a long road to nowhere has had many names over the years throughout the countless generations that have lived both in and near it. Though no one is quite sure when it had earned its latest name, if any passerby had any true inkling of those living within the large home, they'd have understood perfectly the name of the house and how intimately it was connected to those within its walls.

Its name is _Eden's Shard_ and it is currently missing only one of its occupants.

In the living room, with a television screen only one third smaller than the wall it was attached to, sat Dirk von Horte, eyes narrowed against the gray veil and struggling to spot a single speck of color through the many camera screens shown across the massive monitor. At his side on the far side of the couch, typing his way through them one after the other, is Arashi Tomoe, his own eyes narrowed as he multitasked the cycling of cameras and one view in particular as he typed a small missive and watched the excitement shine in the eyes of its recipient.

Opposite them, occupying his own chair is Eirik Ejnar glaring heatedly across the table at Horatio Alexander who smiled serenely in return. On the table between them were a series of playing cards and by the number on Horatio's side and the almost feral scowl on Eirik's face, it was blatantly obvious who was in the lead of this particular match.

"You're cheating." He growled at Horatio. "I don't know how but you are cheating."

"Really Eirik, would I cheat to win?"

"_Yes_." The speakers of Arashi's laptop intoned sharply before the younger boy resumed his task.

"Would you two please stop distracting us? Kaorinite's finally out on the prowl again and—" Dirk cut himself off as the door was torn clean off its hinges as Tobias raced in, minus his headband.

"God damn it, again?" groaned Eirik.

"You must learn that this era is made of weaker stuff Tobias," said Horatio. "Really, you don't see any of us breaking things all over the—"

"She remembers me."

For a moment, there was such stillness that time itself seemed to have ceased its ticking motions. The first to break it spoke softly, his voice soft and understanding and yet, a faint bit of hope shone in his eyes.

"Tobias… We told you that she only remembers her "sempai"… She doesn't truly—"

"She said my name," interrupted Tobias.

Silence.

"That's…" Horatio shook his head. "She couldn't possibly—"

"I rescued her from a hit-and-run and-and she said my name! Then she… she hugged me and by all the stars in Heaven, it was everything I could do not to break down and confess everything to her…"

"By the Chalice, tell me you didn't!" said Eirik.

"No, no, of course I didn't but… but she remembers _me_… She remembers my name but not… Not everything… She remembers when we met in this Age, the times we spent together, but she doesn't recall the ancient past and… and she doesn't remember the cause of this." He waved at his sightless eyes for emphasis. "I didn't tell her anything of it, just that it is an old wound that happened after we became… separated…"

"Well… That's… Well…" Horatio shook his head in clear disbelief.

Tobiase looked towards Eirik, the only other of their group that had met with one of the Senshi in civilian guise. "Are you sure that Lady Hermes did not recall you as well?"

Eirik was silent and glaring hatefully at the floor and when he at last spoke, it was with a growl, "I haven't approached her since her heart was stolen. She did not remember me at all when I had spoken to her, there was nothing about me important enough for her _to_ remember from this life or the last."

"… _Maybe not…_" Arashi typed at his laptop. "_As ingrained as her sempai is into her heart, just seeing Tobias would not be enough for her to suddenly recall his name and most of their past prior to… the Event…_"

Dirk's eyes widened with sudden realization. "Did you touch her?"

Tobias' face flushed red. "Wh-What?"

Eirik rolled his eyes. "Not that way you idiot! As in literally! Your flesh upon hers!"

Tobias didn't really think that sounded any better but he understood what Eirik was trying to say. "I… Yes?"

"That… might have done it then…" Dirk murmured to himself. "I'm not certain until I've seen the effect myself but considering they and us are nearly shining with _Power_… It would be akin to a static charge really, a sudden spark to bring startle one's senses…"

A blur of shadows and Horatio was at the doorway, bowing apologetically to Dirk as he grasped his cane tightly in one quivering hand and Eirik's wallet in the other. Cards flowed out from the sleeves of his shirt as he bowed once more to Dirk and gasped a quick, "Excuse me."

Another burst of sudden darkness and he was gone.

"Did he just—?" Eirik shot off out the door after Horatio but fully intending the same plan. "Give me back my bus pass you fucking crow bastard!"

Dirk sighed and looked imploringly at Arashi. "Follow those two and make sure they don't end up killing each other… or getting arrested for molestation."

Arashi's shoulders shook as he silently laughed. "_I don't think either of them had it in them to go that far even back then but yeah, this'll be a show too good to miss!_"

Arashi tossed his laptop to Dirk and raced off to follow after the others, leaving Tobias alone with their color-blinded leader. Dirk sighed and glanced down at the laptop's screen and froze.

"Tobias."

"Yes?" Tobias snapped to attention on pure instinct in response to Dirk's tone.

"Your bandanna. You gave it to Makoto?"

"It was her scarf originally before she gave it to me, it seemed fitting for her to have again. Why do ask?"

_… Shit_ Dirk inwardly cursed. "Tobias. I need you to remain _calm_. Can you do that for me?"

"… I can promise to try."

_Good enough. _"It would appear that the next target for the DEATH Busters is—"

Too far to hear, too far to smell, too far to taste on the breeze, and yet Tobias turned sharply in the direction of Makoto Kino as she came under attack from a daimon. His fists clenched tightly and his teeth lengthened into sharp canines as an inhuman light began to shine beneath his sunglasses.

"Tobias." The blind youth turned sharply, a growl in his throat that turned into a faint whimper as Dirk sat calmly before him, a mountain to his gale, his own eyes shining. "Calm. Down. Sailor Mercury and the Princess are already on the scene. They will easily—"

He blinked.

"It ran away." Dirk muttered to himself.

The surprise that simple statement wrought was enough to break through Tobias' rage. "It _what?_ Can they even _do_ that?"

"Evidently they can…" murmured Dirk. "It ran away before it or the Outers had a chance to see her pure heart crystal…"

_Which means she'll still be targeted…_ Tobias realized and started for the door, "I'm going."

"Tobias—"

A fist collided with the wall and burst right through it. Tobias took a deep, shuddering breath and let it out slowly. "I just found her again. I can't lose her, Dirk. Not again. Not ever."

"…I will not stop you Tobias but remember. Keep. Control. If you should slip, even for an instant…"

"I know." Tobias' hand went to his lenses where milky white eyes sat beneath them. "I remember even if she does not."

* * *

They were dead.

"Right according to plan."

Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune.

"Yeah… I feel sorry for her but we have to do this."

They were both dead.

They just weren't aware of the sentence hanging like a swaying guillotine over their heads.

The elfin-bodied daimon known simply as Scar smile beautifully as she cupped the pure heart crystal in her grasp. Composed almost entirely of emeralds, it seemed to contain within its crystalline shape a thunderstorm as sparks danced merrily with the jeweled segments. A simple gesture hurled the pure heart crystal to the waiting grasp of Kaorinite only for another to come between master and creation even as a _World Shaking_ shattered against impenetrable armor.

It was a hulking figure covered in thick, amethyst armor from head to toe with stripes of sapphire fur like a vest upon his chest and the few openings between segments along the hips and legs. The Amethyst Knight's arms were thick, almost tubular, and the fingers were nothing but sharpened claws like that of a grizzly's own. Thick spikes no longer than a foot and no shorter than half that length ran up the arms, three on each limb, with the seventh residing as a short curved horn upon the Ursine Warrior's brow where the distinctly bear-like visage of the brow was caught in a permanent roar of rage. Upon his neck was a choker bedecked with a medallion of clubs.

Yet, despite his rather fearsome visage, the Amethyst Knight's grasp was soft, almost tender as he held up the pure heart crystal with one clawed hand.

"My Lady…"

"Hey, give that—" Kaorinite's breath left in a powerful exhale as the Ursine Warrior's fist imbedded itself deeply into her gut. For a moment, it seemed as though time itself had stopped before resuming with spectacular force as the full power behind the blow flowed into Kaorinite and the red-haired witch was sent flying out into the open sea where she soon vanished as a twinkling star on the horizon.

The Amethyst Knight landed heavily upon a lamppost and bent it down to the earth with him as his grasp upon it refused to yield until his feet were fully upon the ground once more. Clutching the pure heart crystal close to his chest, he walked towards the barely conscious form of Makoto Kino.

"SCAR!" A stretch of cloth ensnared his free limb. "Give back that heart—EEP!"

He grasped the cloth tightly and _pulled_. Scar, the poor daimon, had no idea of the strength behind this particular Servant of Terra as she was dragged through the air. The Ursine Warrior raised his fist to meet her as the spikes along his form suddenly flickered with starry brilliance.

"**_Polaris Blitz._**"

His fist met Scar's face and an explosion of light blinded the watching Outers for a moment and by the time the spots were clear from their vision, Scar was gone and the bandanna which birthed her was clenched tightly in the Amethyst Knight's grasp, his other hand empty of the pure heart crystal. Sailor Uranus turned sharply to Makoto and was relieved to see the color returning to the young girl's skin and her eyes flickering open.

That relief was extremely short-lived as the Ursine Warrior turned slowly to face them. His clawed fingers slowly started to clench into fists and the ruby red lenses began to glow from within. He took in a deep breath of air and released it slowly in a thick cloud of steam pouring forth from the vented mouth guard.

"What _are_ you?" Sailor Neptune whispered, almost too quietly for Sailor Uranus to hear so she thought it impossible for the Servant to have possibly—

"I am called Berserker. Do you want to know why?" His voice was calm, steady really, and both Outers were immediately on edge from it. More so then when they had met Archer and Assassin. Both of those Servants' rage had been made obvious with their vicious exclamations of their characters but this one was calm. Calmer even then Saber had been.

And coming from a Servant named Berserker… well such calmness was rather frightening.

"If it angers me or mine I crush it. If it attacks me or mine I break it. If it harms one of mine I destroy it. If it manages all three however…"

Light began to shine once more in the seven spikes along Berserker's arms and the solitary horn upon his brow, together referred to as _the Saptarishi_.

"_I_ _kill it_."

Sailor Uranus had time enough to put herself completely in front of Neptune, arms crossed tightly over her chest and eyes closed tight for the blow that never came. Not when it was interrupted by a most unlikely source.

"… Sempai…"

Berserker's fist hovered centimeters away from Sailor Uranus' face. His whole form trembled once and he backed away from the two confused Outers. He turned to regard the unconscious Makoto Kino, his clawed fingers clenching and unclenching. The girl turned her head towards them, eyes closed and her lips moving silently to a name. A small smile and a rosy blush soon adorned her face.

"Go. Before I change my mind." Berserker whispered to the Outers.

The two needed no further prompting and vanished into the night. Berserker approached and knelt down next to the sleeping Makoto. He ran a claw gently through her hair, taking in the scent of oaken forest and the faint buzz of electricity. He looked to his other hand and saw how tightly it remained clenched, still quivering to unleash the blow intended to end another's life. He took in a deep breath of her scent once more and the hand relaxed, unclenching slowly.

"Only you, my Lady Zeus… Only you."

* * *

One would think that those who had a hand in the creation of the daimons would have had the sense to instill in them some form of psychic precognition. Not the kind that true psychics possess mind you, just the kind that every man, woman, and child on the face of the Earth possesses. You know it, that tiny little voice in your head that precedes catastrophe? The one that warns you that the path you're about to walk down will not end in Happily Ever After?

Some call it a conscience.

Others refer to it as common sense.

To the daimon, this could be called self-preservation.

For the daimon born out of a statue of a heart, one built purposefully for a competition of lovers proving their love to be the greatest of them all, one would think that she would be the strongest of her kind. Given that she was, thus far, the youngest of them meant little. For it is not the date of a daimon's creation so much as it is the item that births it. Dolhpin, for example, had been born of water and had she not earned the freezing wrath of Archer and his bullets, she would have succeeded in snatching the heart of Ami Mizuno. Mikuji, having been born from wood, easily fell to the bladed feathers of Saber's obsidian wings mere minutes after taking the crystalized heart of Rei Hino. From one device sprang the double-bodied Tiren, whose multiplied form did not spare her death from the daggers of Assassin. Even the daimon Scar, born of material cloth, crumpled beneath the fist of Berserker.

The daimon Die Heart, birthed from a statue of a heart, did not possess any true qualities of that which consists within said organ. She is as much a daimon as any other of her breed but just as her sisters before her, she too possessed a unique quality. Hers is the power of illusion, to bring forth the heart's perfect ideal and make it as real as life could allow in the eyes of her prey. She had easily done so to the Sailor Senshi and they were dancing like fools with her offspring, shades of her power.

And now, she had her eyes set upon the last of the interrupters.

Her eyes gleamed and she smiled as the charging armored figure skidded to a halt and stood before her as still as the very stone that she arose from.

Poor Die Heart…

Though her power could be questioned her intelligence, or lack thereof, could not. For you see, just as genetic memory told the daimon of the strengths and weaknesses of the Sailor Senshi that every past daimon encountered, so too did it do the same for the Servants of Terra. She thought herself capable of ensnaring a Servant in the same trap for she thought she knew all that they were capable of.

Die Heart, nay, _everyone_ thought they knew the full potential of the Servants of Terra.

Except for a pair of cats, they couldn't even begin to fathom their power.

For you see, to each and every Servant… there is a _Gift_…

You remember it don't you? That casual mention by Assassin to Sailor Moon and Sailor Uranus? He stated outright that he did not possess the _Gift of Freedom_ as Archer did. Each Servant possesses one and only one _Gift_. It is theirs and theirs alone to be used whenever and however they deem it necessary and no force in all of Creation is capable of withstanding their power of these _Gifts_ save perhaps for another of an opposite nature. Why? Because these _Gifts_ are a **Power** **of Creation**, one of several countless guiding forces to which life, death, and everything in between has come into being.

Saber, the Raven of Nevermore, possesses the _Gift of Chance_, the ability to make the improbable possible by bending the powers of probability to his whim. With this particular Gift, there is not a single object in all of Creation incapable of being snatched up in his eagerly grasping hands. Archer, the Wolf of Ragnarok, carries with him the _Gift of Freedom_, and so no lock remains sealed, no closed door, before him. Nothing in all of Creation exists that can bind him, physical or otherwise. Assassin, the Spider of Fables, is perhaps the most ironic in his _Gift of Voice_, where every word he utters paints a picture so lifelike in the minds of his listeners that it is only those of strong will that are able to perceive the fiction being uttered into their ears. Berserker, the Bear of the Stars, arguably has the strongest of the Gifts bar one other. His is the _Gift of Truth._ With this _Gift_, he can see the truth beneath the lies, the hidden amongst the unseen, and so much more…

Such is the power of the Servants of Terra.

Such is their tragedy.

For though they are _Gifts_, they are not without their price. For all the good luck he can attain, so too must there eventually come the bad for how then can Saber tell the two apart? It was a good thing that the price of such a reminder came in the full functionality of Horatio's legs. Archer's Freedom is a wonderful thing to have but not so easy to give to another, particularly if one does not possess the right key. Eirik's arm made a good fit. Words alone can only say so much before the picture comes crumbling apart at the very seams, especially those of a supposedly silent Assassin. Arashi's last words were drowned and buried beneath the sound of his screaming before even that too was silenced. The Truth can be a terrible thing for any sane mind to experience so what then could result in the insane mind of a Berserker? Not too much, just enough to render Tobias blind in both eyes.

Such is the tragedy of the Servants of Terra.

Such is their power.

With his _Gift of Chance_, Saber could twist Die Heart's spell and make an impossible dodge. With his _Gift of Freedom_, Archer could readily break out of a simple illusionary spell and the grandmaster of the craft, Assassin and his _Gift of Voice_, could easily fool Die Heart into believing herself safe from harm right until the Neith pierced into her abdomen.

However, it was none of these three Servants that Die Heart had ensnared.

It was Berserker.

He saw the lies first. The ballroom of Elysium, its golden walls pristine as they were upon their forging countless centuries before, the crowds of nobility from across the entire Galaxy, and there, in the center, a Lady of the Solar Court with her hand outstretched towards him with a beautiful, loving smile that sparkled only slightly more than the engagement ring upon her finger.

Then… came the _Truth_. A palace so far gone into the recesses of time that not even dust remained of it. The people dancing merrily within its walls now moved about as ghastly wraiths of the long since forgotten. And the woman, the Lady for whom he had offered all of himself to, stood as an entirely different person in his eyes, the same soul reincarnated in this so-called "modern" age. She wasn't smiling and her hand was bare of any signet for in her eyes there was no such thing as remembrance, only frightened confusion.

Lady Lita of the House Zeus was dead and the girl that she had become, this Makoto Kino, knew nothing of him or the sacrifices he had made in her name.

Such was the bittersweet kindness of the Truth.

To those far and away from Juuban Park, it started as a small rumble. The kind of sound that often follows a weak flash of lightning's brilliance in an otherwise gloomy afternoon rain shower, but what started out as something weak, pathetic almost, quickly overcame such constraints.

It was a sound no mortal being could ever hope to voice a second time for none could survive the sheer torment needed to make such a scream twice with their sanity intact, never mind their heart or soul. And that was precisely what this horrendous sound was. A scream unlike any other; a terrible wail of despair to make even the stoniest of hearts crumble into dust, a ravaging roar of such rage as to make the iron willed bend like cheap plastic. Such a terribly agonizing sound it was, the very sky appeared to shatter apart as dusk became night at last.

The Inner Senshi blinked themselves free from the illusions of Die Heart thanks in part to the scream but most of the credit went to what their eyes soon fell upon. What they saw quickly made them wish that their freedom had not been attained so readily. Viscous fluids that could almost be blood splattered the earth amongst torn chunks of flesh and limb as a maddened Berserker stood above the weakly wailing form of something that could almost be called living if it weren't being crushed beneath stomping feet.

"Die!"

**BOOM.**

"_Die!_"

**BOOM.**

"**_Die!_**"

**BOOM. **

"**_DIE!_**"

**BOOM. **

Over and over the Berserker grunted under his breath. Over and over, Berserker's heavy boots descended with earth trembling force upon the quivering remains of Die Heart. She had become a beautifully ugly amalgamation of stone and flesh as the time between blows allowed no chance for the daimon to die completely before a new wave of agony kept her alive still.

"What a monster…" were the whispered words of Sailor Neptune from the shadows of the trees. Sailor Uranus nodded in silent agreement.

The Saptarishi flickered briefly before igniting fully as Berserker screamed upwards into the underbelly of Heaven itself.

"**_Summer…!_**"

The earth trembled from a sudden rushing stampede and the Senshi, both Inner and Outer, gasped in astonishment at what came walking to the silent siren call of Berserker's power. Like his fellow Servants, Berserker's power called to those whom they resonated with. For the obsidian Saber, it was ravens, for the azure Archer, wolves, and for the ivory Assassin it was spiders. For Berserker… it was something more than mere animals, garbed in soft flesh and breakable bones. No, these creatures, if such a word could be attributed to them, were not born of flesh and bone. They were born of the stars themselves.

Berserker raised his arms upwards to the Heavens and roared.

"**_Star…!_**"

Constellations, the entire lot of them, and though the pack was small, it was plain to see that only the animalistic of them had come to witness Berserker's display of power upon Earth once more. From the huntsman's hound to the hellish hydra all but one beast that graces Heaven's sky was there in all of their starry glory. For as the shine of the Saptarishi increased in brilliance, so too did the twinkling lights within the bodied constellations as they towered like beastly monoliths.

"**_BREAKER!_**"

The Berserker's fists descended upon Die Heart and struck upon her with the force of an asteroid. The resulting light was blinding enough to turn night into day and when it died away, all that was left of the small section of the park was a smoking crater with Berserker standing tiredly at its epicenter with his silent watchers retiring once more to their rosters in the Heavens above. There was no sign of Die Heart, not even the seed that birthed her forth from a stone heart.

He turned and looked over at the Inner Senshi, watching in silence as they flinched away from his illuminated gaze. He glanced downwards and off to the side as he caught a familiar pair's scent. "So, you two made it."

A pair of Outer Senshi thought he was referring to them. A pair of Moon Cats knew otherwise and swallowed nervously for it.

"Just so that you are aware… he made it too… in far better condition than any of us." Berserker turned and started walking away. "A pleasant night to you, Ladies of the Solar Court… and you as well, Princess Serena of the House Selene."

And he was swallowed into the night, leaving behind a confused pair of Outer Senshi, a stunned quintet of Inner Senshi, and a disgruntled duo of Moon Cats, one who felt it necessary to voice their opinion on Berserker's words.

"Son of a bitch."

"Luna…"

* * *

It was just like before.

_"I commend you on your dedication to the Crown, Servant."_

_"Pardon Your Majesty but we are not yours. You know to whom we belong and it is by Her Will that we protected your offspring. It is our regret that we could not claim the same for your wife."_

_"Yes… a pity… Endymion. To bed with you a—"_

Back then, when he was trying to find his Princess of the Moon…

_"A pretty sight, wouldn't you say?"_

_"She is…"_

_"Just remember, look don't touch. Last thing we need is an interplanetary incident."_

Memories of a past once lived and now nothing more than bittersweet reminders of what could have been.

_"You are playing a dangerous game, Prince. Playing nice with the Moon Princess? Most would think you mad."_

_"And you don't?"_

_"It would be rather hypocritical of me, of any of us Servants, wouldn't you agree?"_

But these were different.

_"What's going on? What's happening?"_

_"It's the Servants of Terra, Your Highness! They—They've gone mad is what they say!"_

There was no happiness, no love, in these memories.

_"They've killed King Elatha! Queen Serenity has declared them enemies of the System and has set the Senshi upon them!"_

Just blood.

_"Why…? Why would you do such terrible things!? Tell me why damn it!"_

War.

_"This is the end of the Golden Era."_

And death.

_"This is the end of us all."_

Do you remember yet, Mamoru Chiba?

* * *

_To be continued..._

* * *

_**Next time...**_

**_Pierce_**

"_It's a rare man who is taken for what he truly is… There is much misjudgment in the world. … We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream._"


	6. 05: Pierce

**DISCLAIMER:** All copyrighted materials belong to their respected owners.

* * *

**The Gathering**

By Corvus no Genmu

* * *

05: Pierce

"_It's a rare man who is taken for what he truly is… There is much misjudgment in the world. … We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream._"

On an island perpetually wrapped in blankets of mist there is a tree. A tree of such size as to contain within its massive roots whole entire worlds and the stars in its boughs. It was here, standing amongst the roots of this great tree that he waited in silence in his mortal form. Curling about the tree, an ethereal rendition of its full glory, an ethereal voice questioned him the notion of waiting for death's rapid approach. The man standing in the shadows of the great tree did not answer, his eyes locked upon the beams of dusk's light that traversed through the leaves, casting an emerald hue amongst the reddening skies.

"Where are they?"

His eyes closed at the familiar voice. "Dead. Hidden. Does it matter which? I am the last as you already know I'm sure."

"You will not surrender…?"

He smiled depreciatively and said, "Not to you or the authority you represent."

"It doesn't have to be this way."

He shook his head in denial. "No. It has to be this way because your Queen has made it so that there can be no other. How quickly she took the reins of her empire…"

"Don't you dare! She was your Queen too!"

"Terra take me now if I ever swore myself to her! You more than anyone else should know who I would have sworn myself to."

He tasted the scent of blood and wondered if it came from her biting upon her lower lip. "Tell me why… Why did you kill him? He could have been saved! The Imperium Crystal—"

"Could not have done the impossible. He was already dead. We merely made it known throughout the System."

"No… No, you couldn't possibly have known—"

"I knew the instant he spoke of things beyond his comprehension. I can only hope that the Queen has far greater sense than to try and follow in her husband's footsteps. We both know where that road leads, don't we Mi—"

**_KISH!_**

"Huh…" He blinked and watched in bemusement as the magically focused beam of light bounce off the trunk of the tree like spraying water. He smiled as a trickle of blood fell from his lips as he turned to finally look at his executioner. "So…"

She stood in full uniform, her arm still raised and finger pointing straight at his chest, where blood flowed freely. She didn't speak, her wide, blue eyes watching as the reddened stain grew larger as he wavered on his feet.

"You… really don't… have a heart… do you… My Lady…?"

With one more bloodied cough, his eyes closed and he fell backwards and out of sight, lost to the great roots of the mighty tree.

* * *

With a great, startled gasp of air, she lurched upright in her bed eyes wide and her skin clammy with sweat. She panted for breath, drawing her knees in close and hugging them tightly to her chest as she struggled to press down upon the urge to scream. She had failed the first few nights since the nightmares had started but she was getting better at it. She glanced aside to the farthest corner of her room and was relieved to find no feline eyes awaiting her in the darkness. Much as he tried to offer his help, Minako just couldn't find any solace in confessing her nightmares to Artemis. After all, how could he make any sense of them when she couldn't?

She wondered again if it was not the fault of that daimon Die Heart whether by the monster's maliciously cruel illusionary attack or Berserker's brutal methods of destroying it.

_No… it was the illusion. That's where it all started…_ She drew her legs in further; curling into a small ball as she fought against the memory of her in a dress befitting a princess, dancing in the arms of an emerald eyed man. A man who held her tenderly in his arms as his lips brushed teasingly against her ear as he whispered sweet nothings into it.

The same man she dreamed of killing night after night and who, with his last breath, accused her of not having a heart.

A tear fell from her eyes as her mouth moved soundlessly to form a name.

* * *

"Dirk…?"

The young man did not turn to face his late-night visitor. "Horatio? Something that you need?"

"… It's three o'clock in the morning."

"So it is."

"… You were still sitting there when I went to bed. That was six hours ago."

"Your point?"

"My point," sighed Horatio as he carefully took a seat on the couch beside him. "Is that I'm the one with malfunctioning legs. What reason could you possibly…?"

Dirk's eyes snapped up and saw that the Native American's eyes were now upon the computer screen, more specifically the live video feed currently on display.

Horatio sat back and eyed his friend with an understanding smile. "… It would be hypocritical of me, of any of us, to judge you, Dirk. Some of us more than others I admit but…"

"She's the only one that hasn't had her pure heart taken yet, Horatio. That's all."

"Somehow, I doubt that the DEATH Busters will try and make off with her heart this early in the morning." Horatio said. He waited to see if Dirk would try and refute this but the older boy remained silent. He glanced once more at the screen. He noted, "Is she crying?"

"She had another nightmare." Dirk blinked as he realized his slip. _Shit._

"Another nightmare huh…" said Horatio with a knowing smile on his face. "Dirk, is it so wrong to admit that you still have feelings for her? As Arashi is frequent in reminding us, these are not the same Ladies we once knew nor are we to them. Just some food for thought."

With a tired grunt, Horatio pulled himself up to his feet and shuffled off back to bed. Dirk watched him go in silence before his eyes fell to the laptop screen once more. His eyes narrowed and he zoomed in on the blonde's face, pressed against her knees.

_… She's crying again._

"… Maybe I do need some fresh air after all."

* * *

The world is dark in Dirk's eyes. There is no color—there is no _magic_ to it as there once was. Such is the way that he sees the world now with mage's sight alone that it is all that he can do just to see the shadows that occupy this Bronze Age, the era to follow after the Silver Millennium and the Golden Era that preceded even that century of prosperity and peace amongst the System. People walk by him, and like the world, they are all colorless save for the youngest and most imaginative of children for Imagination, much like Magic, is Power unrivaled but by one. Yet even these inquisitive young souls are but a fade coloration of the spectrum and as they age and grow accustomed to the changing world, they too become as shadowed as their elders. Even those places sanctified and untouched by man —the nearby park where centuries old trees dwell— and those that reek of man's machinations—shrines and churches where mankind bows their head in prayer—they all are stagnant and lifeless.

There is no Magic here.

It is dead and gone.

And sometimes, in those rare moments of utter blackness and bittersweet remembrances, Dirk wishes the same of himself.

His hand reaches up and caresses an old ache at his chest and he turns to regard a nearby bookstore. He could have sworn that he had seen a sparkle of coloration out the corner of his eye. His eyes narrowed and he shook his head, smiling ruefully as he thought that perhaps some magic tome had managed to secure its way to a local bookstore ready to unleash unprecedented havoc upon the world…

It wouldn't have been the first time.

Deciding to err on the better side of caution, Dirk headed towards the shop, and was pleasantly surprised to find it advertising itself as a place that sold books and only books amongst its shelves. Not that he had any disfavor for the rising tide of manga, but honestly, if he saw another pair of girls eyeing him whilst giggling behind a book labeled as being yaoi there would be—

He froze.

There, standing at the store entrance, was the Princess and her two advisors. While the two Moon Cats were as colorful as they could be, what with them being white and black respectively, they could be colored in hues of orange and purple for all the good it would do compared to whom they stood beside. The Princess—_Usagi_ Dirk reminded himself forcefully—was akin to the very Moon she once ruled and shone with the same light even in the midst of the daylight.

It looked as though they were trying, and failing, to spy on someone. Assured that none of the three would recognize him for who he truly was, Dirk stepped past them into the store itself and for a moment too fast for human, or inhuman, eyes to catch, he froze yet again. Yet, unlike before, he could swear that his heart had stopped beating.

Faster than the winking of an eye, Dirk recovered himself and kept walking, taking a sharp turn around a shelf and placing himself in an unoccupied corner of the room. Because it was not just Minako Aino that Dirk saw perusing the shelves of the small bookshop. He glanced out the corner of his eye as he pretended to peruse a book of Grimm's Fairy Tales and saw them both, huddling together as they had always done.

Haruka Tenou and Michiru Kaioh.

He wondered again at the sheer frequency in which they ran into the Princess and her Ladies of the Court. They obviously did not recognize them for who they were or had been so there could only be one possible explanation. Some could call it fate, others luck, a few perhaps would dare to call it the machinations of God, but not Dirk. No, he knew who it was to blame for this and he cursed the name in every language that he could.

_Just what kind of game are you playing at here? _Dirk glanced away from the two Outers and looked once more at the chief source of his recent frustrations and bit down a surprised gasp at her choice of reading material.

Guide to a Pure Heart.

_Of all the—and in front of **them **no less? Why does she think a public bookstore is the best place to try and get into the enemy's mindset?_ Dirk massaged the bridge of his nose as he realized for certain how true Horatio's words had been. The woman that he had known would not be so foolish as the girl he was watching over now.

He blinked and slammed the book in his hand shut.

_No. I will not be her Guardian. Not any more._ His hand reached up and clenched tightly upon the leaf-shaped pendant on his neck. _No matter the strings you pull…_

He turned and started for the exit when he heard Minako ask the pair, "What do you think makes a heart?"

Dirk froze for the third time in as many minutes. He repressed the urge to slam his head against the wall but could not hold back the almost thunderous growl that sent nearby people scurrying away from the angry Germanic youth. _Of all the things to ask you ask them that?! What is WRONG with you Lady Aphrodite!?_

He realized what he had called her, if only in his mind, but Dirk could hardly care he was so angry. She was openly making herself a target to the Outer Senshi and the DEATH Busters both with her childishly stupid questions. What could possibly be going through her mind as to think it necessary to ask someone what makes a heart?

"Th-They might try and do something good for others…" suggested Haruka, sounding as unsure as she looked.

A glance out the window gave Michiru inspiration for her suggestion, "Like donating blood perhaps…?"

"Thank you very much!" Dirk blinked at the sharp breeze and glanced out the slowly closing door with wide, incredulous eyes.

_That was…_ He smiled despite himself and buried himself once more into the book. _Fast enough to outrun the Light itself… The more things change, the more they stay the same…_

More than halfway towards the blood donation drive, Minako skidded to a halt. She turned sharply back the way she had come as she felt that strange, aching tug in her heart once more. Perhaps it was the long run that troubled her recollection but she could swear that, for even a moment's time, she had seen him, standing there in the bookshop.

Smiling at her…

Minako's face lit up in a pleasant blush as she beamed upwards into the sky.

_That's right! Watch me! I'll prove to you that I have a heart! If it's the last thing that I do!_

Oh Minako…

Don't you know that such words are an open invitation for trouble?

* * *

There are some daimon whose choice in items from which to be born are incredibly spot on. Having a specific target in mind, Kaorinite all but guarantees that the daimon will select an object that the intended victim is sure to touch and as such be an easy target. Sure, some items in particular were hard pressed to be frequently visited, the pool for one Ami Mizuno or a tree for Rei Hino just to name a few. Why, even for Makoto Kino, it had been the pure happenstance of a reunited lover's treasured bandanna that had nearly done her in. Perhaps it was the fear of failure or the long recovery of her encounter with the Servant aptly named Berserker that had poor Kaorinite choosing for the latest daimon, a poor item from which to be born.

A volleyball.

But not just any volleyball, oh most certainly not. No, Kaorinite had to be certain that the next target was sure to touch the ball and while the one in the victim's room made for an apt choice, the amount of dust weighing down upon it spoke quite loudly of its infrequent use. So no, she did not intend for the daimon to be arisen from a personally own volleyball.

She chose one from the girl's school.

Which in and of itself, not too bad a plan if Kaorinite hadn't thought ahead and realized that, like most school-owned properties, that some items tend to go missing…

Or in the case of one poorly hit volleyball lobbed over the school fence and out into the city.

Let us excuse the long series of misadventures of the volleyball that would become the daimon Hikyun, for certainly it could be a novel in and of itself, and fast forward to where she would at last be born shall we?

Minako was downing another vial of energy drink when her foot happened to hit a rather dirtied looking volleyball hard enough to send it upwards into the air. Not hard considering she was running towards another blood donation drive, her fifth in as almost many hours. In a blinding flash of light and a scream of agonized rage, the ball morphed itself into the daimon Hikyun, another feminine looking monstrosity that, for reasons known only to itself, possessed a trait that was more disturbing than it was alluring.

Namely, it had volleyballs for breasts.

Yes. You read correctly.

Volleyballs.

For breasts.

There just is not enough prose in the world to describe some things.

Looking quite dirtied herself, and sporting more bandages than strictly necessary even for a creature based on a physically demanding activity, Hikyun brought her hands together in a downwards spike, the black star tattoo on her wrists flaring brightly as she extracted the pure heart crystal of Minako Aino.

Were she not so utterly disgruntled with her recent lot in life, Hikyun might have noticed that Minako had made no attempt to run away or even fight back. With a strangled scream and a burst of shimmering orange light, Minako's pure heart crystal emerged from her breast. Just as her fellow Senshi's own crystals, Minako's was a cut above the mundane in that hers appeared to be made entirely of imperial topaz with its almost regal shade of orange as its glow ebbed to a steady rhythm.

Hikyun landed neatly on her feet, a victorious smirk on her purple-tinted face that soon gave way to a confused frown. While it was not unheard of for a victim to remain conscious when their pure heart had been crystalized and stolen from them, never before had there been one who remained both awake and on their feet.

And laughing…

_Rather creepily too…_ Hikyun wondered again whether her head wasn't still rattling from her experience through Hell itself as she cautiously eyed the blonde haired girl whose hands slowly reached up to caress the crystallization of her pure heart, laughing all the while.

"I have one… I have one…! I have a heart!" Her glazed eyes snapped upwards and Hikyun unconsciously took a step back. Minako turned her head this way and that before catching a faint, reddish line, the same she had seen and yet did not notice in the slightest, mere hours before. "I'll show it to you…! I'll prove it to you that I have a heart!"

Hikyun blinked and watched with open-mouthed shock as the girl did another impossible feat.

She took off running.

"Wh-What the heck?!"

* * *

Dirk stopped short. He blinked owlishly and looked around the city street as pedestrians and vehicles alike seemed to dwindle to an impossibly small amount given the districts close proximity to Tokyo proper. He reached out a hand and swatted at the air, mimicking the motions of one ridding an errant insect, and saw a faintly colored miasma disappear into the colorless void of the world.

_So that's how that works…_ He mused to himself, closing his eyes and rubbing his chin thoughtfully. _Explains why Arashi's cameras never picked up on it, it's too much like what we Servants radiate. I had been wondering at the lack of civilians whenever there's a daimon attack while the Senshi are on the move… I see you were cleverer than you let on Se—_

"DIRK…!"

His eyes snapped open at the call of his name not for the sound of it alone but by whose voice it was spoken.

"DIRK…!"

He turned slowly, incredulous eyes widening at the faded colors approaching him at a sickeningly human pace of a quick, nay frenzied, jog. What he saw did not take his breath away, for he hadn't really any left in him at that particular moment as Minako Aino came running up to him with the happiest smile he had ever seen on her face and her crystalized pure heart clutched tightly in her hands as she held it out to him.

"Look…! Look, look do you see it…? It's my heart…! Do you see it Dirk….?"

For the first time in a long time, Dirk was absolutely speechless, mouth moving soundlessly as he tried to process the numerous impossibilities before him.

"Is this good enough… for you Dirk?" She was smiling still as she wept and she raised a hand to touched lightly upon his chest where an old scar still resided. Her life was draining out of her slowly as hues of gray began to saturate her form right in front of his eyes. "Will seeing this… make you… love… me…?"

She collapsed backwards and he caught her deftly around the waist and watched as her pure heart crystal fell seamlessly into her chest once more. He blinked back at the sudden return of her full radiance before lifting up her unconscious form and laying her gently down upon a nearby bench. How long did he stare at her in silence? It felt like years but couldn't have been more than a minute or two if even that much. His mind was racing to process everything that had occurred, the foundations of what he knew of reality having been broken from right underneath his feet.

_She remembers me…?_

Did you hope otherwise?

_Why should she suddenly remember me?_

Why should she not remember you?

_How could she remember? I haven't touched her, haven't even gone near her until today! All she had was a passing glance—that should not be enough!_

Did you ever think some memories are deeper ingrained than others? That they can transcend time, when they are so deeply rooted into one's very soul? Did you not consider that a passing glance is more than enough?

_… You answer my questions with more questions._

Ah, but suppose that it is you that you already know the answer.

And what you should do next.

Don't you Servant?

Dirk's fists clenched and he looked down the street, catching sight of two familiar beacons of color making a fast approach, trailing fast after a fast void of Silence. The choker upon his neck glistened, the pendant shaped like a shield shining with its own inner light.

* * *

Kaorinite stood atop a skyscraper, glaring down at the damnable daimon that had, of all things, lost a pure heart crystal to the very person it was supposed to steal from! She winced and rubbed gently upon her torso, uttering another cantrip of healing upon her aching and still heavily bruised torso. Had she not taken to the precaution of adding protective enchantments to her person, that beast of a knight Berserker would have killed her in a single blow.

That he had shattered all of her enchantments to such a degree that she'd need a whole moon's time to prepare new ones did little to appease her temper or alleviate her mounting trepidation when it came to those she called Dark Knights.

Her eyes tracked back downwards to the earth below and she saw the daimon enter into a cloud of mist and—

"Wait, what?" Kaorinite blinked and stared down at the city street below. _Where—?_

She blinked as something emerged from the other side of the mist, and rapidly paled as she realized what it was.

A volleyball, badly worn and dirtied with mud, grime…

And blood.

"Do you ever wonder, my dear Kaorinite, why it is that you are still alive?"

A clawed hand gripped her shoulder and it was all that Kaorinite could do to refrain from screaming as the mist flowed upwards from the earth below and up along the skyscraper, enveloping her and her captor from the outside world's view entirely.

"Who prevented Saber from cutting you down? What stopped Archer from putting a bullet into your brain? Why Assassin saw fit to give a warning rather than instant death? How a monster like Berserker could refrain from killing you in a single hit?"

She shivered at the sound of his voice, a harsh but quiet whisper grating like the claws of a beast down along the curve of her ear.

"You are alive because you had yet to truly anger me. You had yet to make yourself a threat in my eyes.

"Such is no longer the case."

A clawed finger scratched lightly upon the bare skin of her shoulder and it was enough to cut the flesh and let the blood beneath drip like crimson tears. She could feel it, his hot breath down upon the back of her neck and she could almost envision the slathered fangs gleaming as they bared themselves.

"I would kill you now. I should kill you now. But I won't. The girl whose heart you tried to steal is alive and unharmed so you have this brief reprisal whilst I deliver her back to the safe and welcoming arms of her family. But do not think yourself safe, my dear Kaorinite. Your life is now ours to end. Count the minutes while you still have them for now you are the hunted. All of us are after your heart now Kaorinite and you will watch as we tear it free from your chest and devour it whole."

The clawed hand relaxed its grip upon her shoulder, releasing it entirely but the mist, the godforsaken mist, only thickened around her.

"Run and live your last moments well, Kaorintie. For when next you meet us, you will die."

She ran and never once looked back to see the shadowed visage of a winged knight be swallowed into the mist.

* * *

Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune ran like they've never run before. Just as the daimon had been, they too had been surprised when Minako had up and run away with her pure heart crystal clutched tightly in her hands. That she was so fast even without her heart, was even more worrying to the pair who had finally resorted to transforming fully into Sailor Senshi to catch up with her and the daimon.

Yet, as they were now their speed just was not enough.

They found Minako Aino first, sleeping peacefully on a bench, a disturbing sight considering that the street before the bench was splattered in large pools of blood. Sailor Neptune's hands went to her mouth, trying to block out the awful stench and the nightmarish visions it brought back to the forefront of her mind. Sailor Uranus' hands tightened and her lips became a grim-set line on her face.

"Those guys again…"

Sailor Neptune turned to her partner. "Do you think it was that one from the park? Berserker?"

Sailor Uranus shook her head. "No, there's no collateral damage anywhere so it couldn't be him or that bastard Archer… Assassin maybe, could it even be that damned Saber…"

"Or perhaps it was me."

The two Outer Senshi whirled to face behind them and cried out as a sudden cloud of mist rushed forwards and enveloped them both out of sight of each other.

"Neptune!"

"I'm here Uranus!" Sailor Uranus felt a gloved hand clutch her own in a tight vice and she relaxed just the slightest bit before glaring out into the mist.

"What do you want? We never did anything to the girl so—"

"Ah, you think that I have a problem with you both? Funny. Here I presumed that it was I that was staying the hands of my comrades from choking the very life out of you two."

Sailor Neptune froze at that and narrowed her eyes to try and see through the mist. The best that she could see of the Servant was that he too bore wings upon his back but nothing else. "Why would you do such a thing? Your comrades have expressed little love for us…"

"As well they should. You had been ordered to kill them after all."

"What?" gasped Sailor Neptune.

"That's a lie! We don't answer to anyone's orders!" Sailor Uranus glared into the mist and found the trembling shadowed visage of the Servant as he laughed uproariously.

"Ah but what I would give to hear you say that to the face of your Queen! But you are right. You forget yourselves Ladies. You forget more than you care to remember and have brought shame onto your respected Houses. You would do better to remember and soon for there is little time left before it all comes to a head. It may be minutes, it may be days, but soon, we will move as we once had. Together under the banner of Terra."

A rustling of wings and the two whirled once more as they felt the Servant's change in proximity, his shadowed visage towering over them both as he glared down upon them.

"Return the girl to her friends… You know to whom she belongs… Right Lady Amara, Lady Michelle?"

Sailor Uranus froze, her gut clenching as though she had been run through with a lance, blood pooling down to the tip of her toes and leaving her ashen faced. "Wh-What did you—?"

The wings unfurled upon the Servant's back and now the pair could see them for what they were.

The wings of a demon…

"Prepare yourselves, Ladies. For come Hell's fury or Heaven's grace, there is only one amongst them left and hers is a heart that we will protect by any means necessary. So don't do the others any favors by getting in the way.

"Or I'll avenge those few Servants."

A flap of those hellish wings and the Servant, and the mist, was gone.

* * *

"So… what happens now?" asked Horatio.

"Now?" Eirik smirked. "We go and kill a witch."

"Which witch?" asked Tobias. "There's… what, five of them?"

"_Technically…_" signed Arashi.

"No." Dirk shook his head. "Not yet."

"What?" exclaimed Tobias. "But you said—"

"_You don't think she'll really do it, do you Dirk?_" Arashi interrupted. "_The chances are astronomical at best… Especially now that you've gone and given her a nervous breakdown…_"

Dirk shrugged but even Tobias could hear the savage grin on his friend's face. "Once is coincidence, twice is happenstance, thrice a work of God, four times and God is no longer a part of the picture. She intends for this."

"…"

Dirk looked around the room, finding every one of his fellows at attention and waiting for his word. "The Princess _will_ be next. Then, and only then, will we move against the DEATH Busters with everything that we have."

"And… The Senshi?" asked Horatio.

"… Come the fury of Hell or the grace of Heaven, whether they at last remember or remain blissfully lost in ignorance, in the end it does not matter. Silence is coming and what follows on its coattails is more than they can handle as they are. We stopped it once, we can do so again."

"Aye but," Tobias looked forlornly at his feet. "There are only five of us now and with the Chalice—"

"It will have to be enough." Dirk looked out the window at a steadily rising moon. "It must be enough."

* * *

"Artemis. You wouldn't lie to me would you?"

The white Moon Cat blinked and looked up at his charge. It was nighttime and after many, _many_ assurances to Usagi and the others that she'd be fine walking home and that her heart, though stolen once before, was forever safe within her breast Minako was able to retire to her room. She was dressed in her pajamas and looking at her reflection in the glass without any real emotion on her face. The same emotionless mask that had been on her face the moment that she was out of sight from the girls and though he had asked her time and time again if she was truly alright Minako would brush aside his concerns.

Looking back on it now, Artemis realized this was the first time that Minako had spoken entirely on her own and not merely responding to someone else.

"Of course I wouldn't Minako. Why would you think that I would?"

"You lied to Luna," she pointed out to him and he winced at that bitter reminder.

"Ah… Well…" Artemis cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"The Servants of Terra…"

Artemis froze and even covered in fur, one could almost see the beads of sweat pouring down his feline form. "Wh-What about them?"

"… Never mind. It's late." Minako rose up and went to her bed, ignoring Artemis' concerned stare as she tucked herself in.

"Minako? Are you sure you're alright?"

"… I will be…" She dug herself in deeper beneath her blankets. _As soon as I find him again…_

* * *

Mamoru Chiba watched as her girlfriend raced away, tears falling from her eyes as she sobbed. He pressed a hand against his cheek and winced at the stinging pain from the hard slap he had gotten for his response to Usagi's question of the importance of the day.

"But… what's today if not an anniversary?" He asked himself, feeling that girls, as a general rule, made it more difficult for men by finding importance in every occasion to mark as an anniversary. Of course he knew the important ones, the day they had come together as a couple and the anniversary of their first meeting (however badly it had gone). Did she honestly expect him to remember the anniversary of the first time they had a date at a movie? Held hands? Shared a straw? And that was only the top of a list that had no end!

"Perhaps it is the most important anniversary of all." Someone spoke up from behind him and Mamoru turned and saw a foreigner, a European by his slight Germanic accent and build, smiling genially at him with emerald eyes twinkling in bittersweet amusement. Mamoru straightened slightly though he knew not why for the man couldn't be any older than him and yet… he felt an instant respect for him… Mamoru winced and pressed a hand against his forehead at the sudden headache that vanished as quickly as it had come.

Whether the emerald-eyed European noticed or not, he gave no indication as he regarded Mamoru as though he were searching for something. Whether or not he found it, there was no indication as he said, "You shall find no fiend in Hell that can ever match the fury of a disappointed woman, be she scorned, slighted, or dismissed without a parting pang."

"I think she got the parting pang though…" muttered Mamoru, rubbing his sore cheek once more.

The Germanic youth chuckled. "It is no less as you deserved I'm sure. Really lad, when a woman asks for a gift that is, quite literally, a material rendition from the classical tale of Cinderella, Christmas is not the one day of the year you should consider where such an expensive present is warranted."

Mamoru blinked and thought for a moment before he paled as he suddenly realized. "It's her birthday today isn't it?"

"Given how hard she slapped you, I'd say that's a definite yes."

"Crap… No wonder she was so angry with me! I've got to try and make it up to her! Oh man, where did she say those slippers were again?"

The emerald-eyed youth chuckled, "Lucky for you, I happen to know the shop. It's not too far or even out of my way. In fact, you could say I have a prior commitment there."

Mamoru sagged with relief, "Thanks… um… I'm sorry but I never got you name?"

"Dirk. Dirk von Horte."

"Dirk von Horte?" Mamoru froze, his eyes going glassy, his hands clenching tightly into fists. He smiled, the light returning to his eyes. "That's a nice name."

"It suits me I think, now come with me if you want to live."

Mamoru looked deadpan at Dirk. "… How often have you used that line as a joke?"

"Not as often as you think for exactly that reason though I wasn't actually joking. I can _feel_ that sting of that handprint on your face from here lad."

"Ah, my name is Mamoru Chiba."

Dirk blinked and realized this was the first time he had heard the reincarnation of the Prince's name.

"… _Protector of Earth…_?" Dirk smiled but there was a touch of something derisive in it. "An apt name I suppose."

* * *

"Are you certain that was a good idea? Using him as bait?" Horatio asked Dirk not for the first time as he and the others sat at the Crown Plaza Café.

"We knew that the Princess would be the next to be targeted. My helping the Prince get the vessel of the daimon seed just confirmed it." Dirk said.

Across from him, Eirik leaned on the table with a savage grin. "Tell me, did you at least scare the shite out of Kaorinite while you were at the shop?"

"_At least more than usual?_" Arashi typed away at his laptop, his eyes tracking the video feeds.

Dirk allowed a small smirk on his face but didn't deign to comment on his methods.

"Is it me or… does this feel almost too easy?" Tobias asked, playing with the straw of his lime-colored soft drink.

"What do you mean, Tobias?" asked Horatio, taking a sip of his coffee.

"It's just… we've pushed Kaorinite to the edge right? She knows that this will be her one and only chance to stop us, to find one of the "talismans"…"

"You getting somewhere here?" grunted Eirik.

Tobias scowled at him and continued, "I'm just saying, we planned for a _reasonable_ Kaorinite. Did we ever consider what an _unreasonable_ Kaorinite would do?"

"Pfft, what could she possible do? Try and kidnap the Prince?" snorted Eirik.

Horatio slowly swallowed his mouthful of coffee and set down his cup to stare at Eirik.

Tobias turned in his seat and even without functioning eyes, managed to glare at the red-haired Norse.

Dirk simply sagged forward, pinching the bridge of his nose to try and ward off an upcoming headache.

Eirik maintained his usual disdainful façade for a moment more before slumping in his chair. "I just jinxed us didn't I?"

"_Oh just a little I'd say…_" Arashi glared as he turned his laptop around so the others could see the screen for themselves.

"… Yeah, I'll just go and take care of that then." Dirk got up from his seat much to the surprise of his gathered friends.

"Wait, what?" Eirik blinked in surprise. "_You_? I thought you said that you couldn't run the risk of being seen? That whatever's got her memories stirring might actually snap everything into place for the rest of them?"

"Would that be so wrong?" Tobias asked. "If they only remembered the Golden Era then—"

"We would have to explain how we "survived"…" Horatio winced as a familiar ache traveled up from his legs and he shifted in his seat.

"_If you can call any of this surviving,_" signed Arashi, indicating his throat. "_You think your girl is going to appreciate knowing she was responsible for your blindness?_"

Tobias' fist slammed into the table but thankfully did not crush it to kindle. "It was not her fault! It was—"

"The past," interrupted Dirk. "And it is dead. Let it lie and be remembered but not relived. We have more important matters to take care of."

"Much as I hate to agree with Eirik," said Horatio.

"Hey!"

"His concern is valid, Dirk. If the Senshi should remember us fully, then they will know us in our civilian guises as well. We cannot escape from their scrutiny. Not as we are now."

"… She only vaguely remembers the human me. She doesn't know me as I truly am. She didn't care enough to, not after… everything. It will have to be enough."

"And if it isn't?"

Dirk didn't answer.

* * *

"Even if your pure heart crystal didn't contain a talisman, don't think that your life is still spared Usagi Tsukino, or rather—Sailor Moon!" crowed Kaorinite, her eyes slightly deranged as she gazed down upon the girl with the two Outer Senshi kneeled on either side of her.

"What?" gasped Sailor Uranus, trying to connect the crybaby Sailor Moon with the klutzy Usagi Tsukino. It just would not compute.

"This girl is…?" whispered Sailor Neptune.

"Not Sailor Moon!" a voice cried out, startling Kaorinite just enough for her to whip her head about to face the intruders. The remaining Sailor Senshi, one of them poorly disguised as Sailor Moon no less, and trying their best to fool her into believing the brooch in her hand was a mere trinket of a fan and nothing more.

_Lies! All lies!_

Whether through fear for her life or desperation for one true success to the man she claimed to love, Kaorinite no longer fell sway to the magics of the Senshi and so could see plain as the sun in a cloudless sky, that the girl before her was Sailor Moon just as the one in disguise was clearly Sailor Venus. A sudden song akin to that of a bell rang out into the night as a thick mist billowed outwards along the floor and clawed its way upwards to the ceiling of the observatory.

"Usagi Tsukino… Sailor Moon… It doesn't matter if you know the truth of her existence or not Kaorinite."

Kaorinite froze. Her ashen skin paled further as a cold sweat broke free upon her crinkled brow.

Beside her, the daimon Senishenta quivered with fear, both hands elongating into swords of emerald-tinted glass.

"Did you forget what I told you? This is it, Kaorinite. Today is the day you die."

"No… NO!" The windows of the observatory exploded in a shower of glass and the roof split apart like the parting of the Red Sea. Needing no further prompting, and frankly finding that their quota had long since been filled for the evening, the two Outer Senshi took the chance to depart and Kaorinite, steadily being pushed to the brink of madness roared with a hellish fury and pursued them, convinced that if she were to live, then she would have to kill the two Senshi. For you see, in the steadily cracking mind of Kaorinite, she recalled if nothing else, the sheer sadistic animosity between the Servants of Terra and the two Outer Senshi. So it stood to reason that if she were to due the Servants the favor of killing the Outer Senshi herself, she might actually be spared.

Senishenta, completely unaware of her maker's thought processes, or supreme lack thereof, stood helplessly as the mist seemed to thicken to such degree that she could hardly see the nose on her face when—

**_CRACK!_**

She found herself staring incredulously at her feet and slowly upwards at her torso where her hands grasped fruitlessly at where her head once resided. Senishenta's body shattered like the glass from which it had arisen until all that remained of her was the shoe from whence she originated. There came a sound of shattering glass and the mists violently contracted inwards until all that it enshrouded was a single solitary figure standing close to the kneeling Tuxedo Mask who gasped and coughed for air.

"Mamo-chan!" Heedless the close proximity of a shadowed figure standing almost protectively at her boyfriend's side, Usagi ran forward and embraced her masked beau tightly, tears falling from her eyes. "Mamo-chan…!"

"Usako…" he whispered, smiling and embracing her in return.

"Charming as this is, I'd like for you to tell your friend there to put down her finger before somebody gets hurt. Rest assured it will _not_ be me."

Usagi looked up into the mist and then back over her shoulder and saw, to her surprise, that it was Sailor Venus who had her hand raised, a mote of light shining at the tip of her finger.

"Venus, what—?"

"Show yourself!" She called at the mist-covered figure, nay almost roared really so enraged was she. "Show yourself or I swear to—" She cut herself off, uncertain for a moment before suddenly finding her resolve as she finished, "or I swear to Terra I'll really let you have it!"

_…!_

"You…" Usagi swallowed and glanced back up at the mist-enshrouded Servant. Even in one word, there was no mistaking the sheer incredulity, the animalistic fury, behind it as the mist revealed the one who called it forth from its long distant shores on an island no man had set foot upon since time immemorial.

He stepped out from the mists slowly, the clawed toes of his boots emerging first from the shadows before the rest of him followed. His armor, for there was nothing else but armor which covered him from top to bottom, was such a brilliant hue of emerald green that it seemed almost as alive as any forest canopy could ever aspire to be. Upon his back were a great pair of bio-mechanical bat wings, well over sixteen feet from tip to tip when unfurled, and resting gently beneath the choker strapped to his neck, a mask of black comedy and white tragedy, dividing finely in two. Great long horns like those of a ram curled back along his head and his visor, colored a strange abysmal gray, was clutched tightly in the silver fangs of a reptilian jaw. He carried no weapons on his person, though some could argue that the length of predatory claws on the tips of his fingers could easily constitute.

"You would _dare_ to utter—" The Servant started to speak when he was interrupted in a most unexpected fashion.

"LANCER!" Sailor Venus hurled herself at the Servant of Terra who was half expecting the fists flying towards him to collide with his face when the arms to which they were attached coiled tightly upon his neck and her lips pressed themselves tightly to the mouth guard of his helmet.

Though many opinions were expressed, both loudly and rather vehemently, at this strange and sudden turn of events, it was one Sailor Mars who said it best with a simple, but oh so eloquent…

"WHAT THE FU—"

**_FLASH!_**

Sailor Mars blinked and shook her head, wondering why it was that she felt so shocked by the appearance of this Servant. At her side, between Mars and Jupiter, Sailor Venus wondered why it felt as though her heart had been broken and why it was that the Servant was staring at her and her alone. Usagi just wondered why it was that she felt she missed something important.

As for Lancer himself… His fists clenched tightly as he tried to forget just as the Senshi and the Royalties had but he was not so blessed by his _Gift_. For you see, just the same as his fellow Servants, Lancer too was given a powerful _Gift_ and just as they his was not one without penalty. Lancer, the Servant who bore the marking of Joker upon his neck, who stood on the fine line that divided the Nine into shades of White and Black, bore one of the most powerful _Gifts_ in all of Creation. Greater than Truth, more versatile than Chance, and more damning than Freedom…

This was Lancer's _Gift of Miracle_.

Miracle… It is by definition, an event or action that is contrary to the laws of nature and is regarded as an act of God. Such is the power of Lancer's Gift. Such is its the tragedy. For as already expressed, Lancer may be capable of performing a solitary miracle in the course of a day's passing, but no such thing as a miracle can be attributed to him and him alone. His is a _Gift _to be shared and shared it was as he miraculously wiped the mind of Sailor Venus and, by proxy, the Inner Senshi and the Royalties of the Earth and the Moon.

Wiped her mind clear of her sudden remembrance of a past that didn't exist and all but guaranteed that such a thing would not also occur in those watching as she broke protocol and—

_Forget it. It is past and the past is **dead. **The past cannot be relived in the present._ Lancer's eyes fell down at the two Royals at his side. _Mostly._

"I suggest that if you want to save the lives of your fellow Senshi, then do so quickly." He said to Usagi who looked up at him, "For though I do not intend to kill them, I will not save them either."

Lancer turned his gaze upwards and his wings flared open and with a single flap, he soared up onto the observatory's roof. He hovered in the air, his gray visor tracking the extensive damages across the steel until he caught sight of the two Outer Senshi. And what a sight they were too, Sailor Neptune was bruised and gasping for breath while Sailor Uranus was sporting a cut shoulder, which in itself wouldn't be too surprising if her own uniform wasn't also sporting an injury. Lancer knew from experience there were few spells that could cut through a Senshi's uniform and grimly realized that the Intel had not been exaggerated.

She _was_ teaching them, however unconsciously, however unwillingly.

Explosions rocketed the area and Lancer flew above the flames and scattering debris with a muttered curse of surprise. Kaorinite was well and truly desperate in her attempt to try and kill the two Outer Senshi given that she never once took notice of his arrival on the scene, only that of the Senshi plus Tuxedo Mask as they announced themselves as they usually did. Lancer took notice of Kaorinite's widening smirk as she saw her suspicions confirmed with Sailor Moon's presence added to the group and his eyes narrowed beneath his helmet.

He landed and crouched down amongst the support beams of Tokyo Tower and watched in silence as Sailor Moon begged for the Outer Senshi to run, to leave Kaorinite's defeat to them. He wondered again if the Princess was truly so selfless or if her friends' ribbing of her character earlier had a grain of truth to them. After all that the two Outer Senshi had done, were still willing to do, she still thought of them as good people.

_How naïve…_

"I thought I said there was no escape!" shrieked Kaorinite as her bracelet flashed with sickly light. The air grew heavy and the Senshi gasped as a magical barrier surrounded the Tower. "Now you have nowhere left to run!"

Lancer rose to his full stature and leaned back against the support beam. He crossed his arms across his armored chest as his biomechanical wings drawing close to fall like a living cloak and watched in silence as the Senshi tried to combat the mad Kaorinite. Something wasn't right. She was a witch, of that there could be no doubt, but just where was she getting this power from? She had little time to try and prepare a sufficient amount of—

A sword of glass arose from the witch's hand, the very same that had been wielded by a daimon not mere minutes ago.

His eyes widened beneath his visor.

_She's not human anymore._ He realized. His right hand stretched out to his side, parallel to the beam he was standing atop of. A ribbon of light extended out from his hand and quickly curled tightly about itself and the offered limb until Lancer held his titular weapon in hand. At first glance, one could call it a jousting lance if a jousting lance could be attributed to something that more closely resembled the tail of a beast complete with sharp, spaded tip. There was only one creature in all of Creation that could possess such a tail, the very creature from whom is Lancer's very Patron.

A dragon.

And though it was but a mere tail of such a beast, this was the _Melusine._

Lancer lowered his arm and aimed the spaded tip of the Melusine down towards the unsuspecting Kaorinite.

Kaorinite, assistant to Professor Tomoe and leader of the B.B.B. was dead.

She just needed time to become aware of that fact.

It was the gaze of the Senshi that clued her to this first. Their eyes widening in shock, their faces paling in horror, and their mouths dropping or snapping shut as some repressed the urge to vomit while others bit back a frightened scream.

Second came a sudden chill, a wintry wind arcing its way through Kaorinite's body like lightning amidst a hurricane. Such a bitter frost that clawed and bit tightly upon the witch's flesh, she almost missed the sudden weakness in her legs and would have fallen to the ground had not something kept her body upright.

Thirdly came the taste of copper, sweet and sick at the same time as liquid red poured gently from her likewise colored lips and down upon the curve of her breasts and past the bloodied lance that had stretched itself past impossible lengths to pierce her heart.

Lastly, came the darkness and the witch Kaorinite, formerly the woman Kaori Naito, knew no more.

"Your name was Kaori Naito." He whispered more to himself then to those below. "I will remember you as you were and not as you had become."

Lancer lifted the Melusine up as the jousting lance shrank down to its normal length, regarding the corpse hanging limply from its end. A vicious swing and he flung the body down into the abyss, losing it to the darkness of the earth below. Lightning crackled and drew Lancer's gaze back to the energy field that surrounded the top of Tokyo Tower.

This time, when he reaised up the Melusine, he uttered a single, powerful word.

"**_δράκων._**"

Once, when mankind was at its begining the accesion to its epoch and its seeds were spreading slowly across the System and into the branches of the Galaxy itself, in a time long before Senshi and the Servants, there was a single Voice to its people. This language, which can at best be named as _Ursprache_, the Primordial Language, was the one and only thing humans, nay, all sentient life on Earth spoke. It is a powerful language the likes of which can have no equal for in this tongue held a _Power_ to every word. To speak it is to weave the very fabrics of Creation itself to make every word uttered into an undeniable Truth. Such is a mere shardling of power in the _Gift of Voice_ bestowed upon Assassin and with such a shard, all the best he can do with it is to whisper imaginings, murmur falsehoods, and mumble deathly assurances.

Such is not so with Lancer and yet even more so.

He knows nothing of _Ursprache_. He cannot speak it, cannot comprehend it, and were it spoken to him he would become deaf as mountain's stone just as any other born after its last Speaker had fallen silently into the grave. Yet he knows one solitary word of it and even an attempt at the word contains with it a fraction of its power. Though those in the world would hear it as the tongue of the Ancient Greeks and would even appear as such when ascribe to paper, it was not so for the Earth.

She heard.

And so too did another.

Somewhere, off in the distance, a bell began to toll for the midnight hour, calling forth the end of a day and the beggining of another.

* * *

Sailor Moon blinked.

She looked to her right. Then she looked to her left. Finally, she glanced upwards and cautiously poked at a bolt and bit back a squeal as it refused to budge. She frantically turned to her friends, frozen as stone, and tried to call out to them but found herself voiceless in this strange realm of timelessness.

**_Pray forgive me. While my vassal is content in letting the past be buried, I do not share the same sentiment._**

She whirled about and choked back a cry as a thick mist swirled around her, separating her from sight of the others.

**_Peace. The mists shroud us both from watching eyes and listening ears. What needs be spoken must be heard only by your ears, Princess Serena._**

Sailor Moon stopped and turned her gaze slowly upwards, where she was certain the voice was at least coming from but she could not see anything beyond the thickened clouds. She had wondered, privately when the thoughts occured to her, of the frequency of being called Princess by the Servants of Terra. Even more so with Berserker and his parting words to her and her friends. But she could never quite bring herself to try and ask Luna what he, nay, any of the Servants were to herself or the others. More than that, she could not bring herself to try and remember the lifetime she had lost

It hurt too much.

**_Aye. The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you have two choices here. You can continue to try and run from it... Or... Look back and learn from it._**

She looked down at the the toes of her boots in silence.

**_Hrmm. Very well, but tell me Princess. Do you not wonder why it is that the Servants show such disdain for Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus? Why it is that they act the way they do when you or your friends are in danger?_**

Sailor Moon looked up into the mist.

**_It is because once, in an age predating that of the Silver Millennium, Servant and Senshi stood together on the battlefield. Together they repelled the forces of Chaos. Until such a time as they were betrayed._**

**_By one of yours._**

Sailor Moon's eyes widened and she turned sharply to where she last saw the two Outers stood but could not quite pierce the thick veil of the mist.

**_No. It was not they who betrayed the bonds first. They merely followed the command that was given to them. To hunt down and kill the Servants of Terra. Of the entirety of the Senshi, it was those two and one other who succeeded in their task. _**

**_Three of the Servants of Terra were slain. One missing. Four gone into the hiding. The last... My vassal... ensured the survival of the four. Such was what needed to be done._**

_But why?_ Sailor Moon cried out silently. _Who could order such a thing?! Who?_

The answer was the last thing Sailor Moon heard before she was snapped back to the true world, the mists vanished as though they never were, time moving on as it was want to do, and Lancer flying off into the darkness of the night.

* * *

Luna's ears tilted back along her head and beside her, Artemis looked anywhere but the eyes of those focused upon the two Moon Cats. The Senshi, plus Tuxedo Mask, had emerged victorious and the enemy was down with one key player but whatever joy or elation they might have felt was vanquished by the look in their leader's eyes. She strode away from the Tower, uncaring of the questions asked of her by friends and lover, noted with disinterest that the Outers had taken the chance to flee in the aftermath, and all but marched for Hikawa Shrine to confront the two cats with a single accusation.

"You know who the Servants of Terra are don't you Luna?"

Well, one in particular but that's semantics for you.

"I know who they were, not what they've become."

"Artemis?" The white cat flinched and looked up at Minako and felt queasy at the look of betrayal in her eyes. "You too?"

"I… Yes… Though we don't remember them fully just as we didn't you or the others…"

"We remember them enough," finished Luna.

"Why didn't either of you say anything then?" asked Makoto, confused.

"Yeah, why all the secrecy you two? It would have been nice knowing just what these guys are capable of instead of being stunned silly every time!" said Rei.

"I have to agree," said Ami. "If they are allies from the Silver Millennium—"

"They are _not_ from the Silver Millennium," interrupted Luna. "They are—"

"From a time before it…" whispered Usagi. "He wasn't lying…"

"Usako?" murmured Mamoru, placing his hand upon her shoulder. "Usako, what is it? Did Lancer say something to you?"

She shook her head and whispered a quite, "Later," before narrowing her eyes at Luna who took a step back from the glare that reminded her too much of—"Did she do it?"

"Did… who do what? Usagi, you're not making any sense," said Luna.

"Did my mother order us to kill the Servants of Terra!" yelled Usagi.

The girls, plus Mamoru, gasped in shock.

"What?!"

"No way!"

"That's—"

"She did."

All eyes turned down to Artemis who met their eyes with a hard stare. "Queen Serenity decreed the Servants of Terra a threat to the entire System and ordered the Senshi to hunt them down and kill them."

_Three of the Servants of Terra were slain. One missing. Four gone into the hiding. The last... My vassal... ensured the survival of the four. Such was what needed to be done._ That voice was a mocking memory in her head as Usagi's hands clenched into fists as she fought back tears.

She remembered how remorseful Saber had been to frighten her as he had. How frightened Archer had been when Ami's life was at risk. How despondent Assassin had been when he declared he and the others to be another mean of defense. How Lancer had spoken of remembering Kaorinite, an enemy, for who she had been and not what she was.

"Why?" whispered Usagi. Louder, she yelled, "Why?! Why would my mother do that?!"

"Because the Servants of Terra killed King Elatha." Luna looked up at Usagi who was surprised to see tears in the feline advisor's eyes. "They killed your father, Usagi."

* * *

_To be continued..._

* * *

_**Next time...**_

_**Blood**_

"_Friendship is held to be the severest test of character. It is easy to be loyal to a family and clan, whose blood is in your own veins._"


End file.
